Wednesday, July 12, 2017

(ADDENDUM ADDED) My comment on Donald Trump Jr.'s "Russia" meeting; with video of Hannity interview

I tweeted regarding the event: "Not evidence of collusion, as none occurred, but politically naive 'satellites' (w/ a dirty trickster) being suckered into such a move."

The point to remember--and many may not realize this--but the emails were completely wrong regarding the Russian government connection. It was a ruse, demonstrated by the fact that there is no "Crown prosecutor" in Russia. Don Jr.'s acquaintance was fed a ruse, which he passed on. So this is by its nature no more evidence of collusion than a Bullwinkle cartoon of Boris and Natasha walking into Trump Tower. A legitimate issue exists regarding the thinking of Don Jr, et al, on this, but as the full substance regarding the emails and event spreads over the next couple of days, anyone saying otherwise will be either ignorant or lying.


One question some have raised is why this is stretching out so much. Trey Gowdy, for instance, has suggested that the campaign staff should be locked in a room to told, "Okay, from the time you saw 'Dr. Zhivago,' to the time you had vodka with a guy named Boris, lay out every connection whatsoever you've had with Russia." One of the concerns I had during the campaign was the Trump team suffered a Tea Party-type lack of political understanding and an almost redneck hick-like lack of analysis skills when it comes to matters of social science. They are smart people, but like so many conservative-types, lack the benefit of the liberal arts-type education that is necessary for political action. Given that Trump Jr. is a businessman, which by nature means he more focused on the actual and direct (as opposed to the theoretical or cross-referenced), it is quite believable that he (and others) would brainfart on all of this and not have this event register. Since the "Russia-Russia-Russia!" craze was not going, it didn't register then. Since it was a complete case of nonsense, he put it out of his mind. And since his mind is trained toward business, not more theoretical things--and since conservative-types tend to be introspective by nature anyway--it would have been, unfortunately, all too easy for this meeting not to register later as an issue to mention.

So, as I said, it was total naiveté.

EDIT: One has to wonder, though, if this meeting might be the genesis of much of the rumoring about a collusion.  "The walls have ears."  Whispers and hints of this may well have leaked out and taken on lives of their own.  Foreign agencies may well have heard of it, causing "chatter" in our communications intercepts of their conversations.  Add in a few odd facts and the direction of the Obama people to politically weaponize intelligence, and this would fit.

WITH ADDENDUM: