Two Urgent Questions The Media Isn't Asking About Trump's Collusion

Some facts:

• Today Trump's campaign manager was indicted and a campaign adviser to Trump plead guilty to lying to the FBI about a contact with ties to the Kremlin.
• The Kremlin definitely meddled in the 2016 election, working to help Trump beat Clinton. 
• Russians invested heavily in Trump's business after his bankruptcies.
• The Trump campaign changed Republican policy to eliminate support for the Ukraine in their battle against Russia over Crimea and other territory.
• Trump has attacked and criticized fellow Republicans, former allies, even his own staff but has never spoken negatively against Putin.
• Trump's son and son-in-law and key officials met with Russians to discuss compromising information on Hillary Clinton shortly before Clinton emails were released by the Russians during the campaign.

Speculation:
It is plausible that Trump colluded with the Russians to steal the 2016 election.

It is not too soon to ask two really big questions, questions that will have to be addressed if speculation about Trump stealing the presidency prove true.

If Trump is found guilty of colluding to hijack a presidential election,

Who should then assume the presidency? 

1. Vice President Pence? 

The problem with this is that Pence is only VP because of Trump's victory. If Trump's victory is invalid, so is Pence's claim to replace him.

2. Hillary Clinton?

The obvious argument here is the Olympic's argument: if the gold medal winner has cheated then the official winner is now the silver medal winner. There are so many obvious problems and complications with this that one hardly knows where to start. Suffice to say that it is unprecedented. Suffice to say that a candidate colluding with a foreign power to steal the presidency is also unprecedented.

3. Barack Obama?

The allure of this is that it would return the presidency to the last fairly elected person, and return the presidency to someone obviously experienced in the job and able to quickly take over. Obama could hold office while a new election was called and Americans chose a new president. This is unprecedented within the US but not within countries where elections have obviously been tampered with. (And obviously raises dozens of important questions about how to create a presidential election outside the normal election cycle, or even whether such an election should be arranged or if the replacement for Trump should be allowed to serve the term through 2020.)

4. Paul Ryan?

This makes sense because order of succession gives the speaker the White House in the event that the president and vice president are unable to serve. It also has the obvious problems that Pence has in that it would award the presidency to the party whose head stole the presidency.

5. Joe Biden?

Far fetched but would answer the rebuttal to Obama taking the office after serving 2 terms.

Should all of Trump's executive orders and judicial and cabinet appointments be automatically rescinded?

For instance, would Supreme Court Gorsuch lose his seat? Would any legislation signed by Trump automatically be deemed invalid?

The American people are unprepared for any of these answers. The polarization that we already see in media coverage and arguments could actually escalate into violence if Pence or Obama (or any of the others mentioned above) replace Trump and yet such options are really the only options we have. This can hardly be stressed enough: any option will be unacceptable to many - perhaps most - Americans.

A responsible media would begin processing what is next right now. If it works out that Trump did not collude and is not going to be impeached or resign, then fine. The media exploring these questions would have only explored some fascinating options in a fascinating year. If it works out that Trump did collude and thus cannot hold the office he stole, there will be no such thing as too much time for Americans to work through what has to happen next.

Warning - Blog Author Ranting About World War IV

We're getting to the point where there aren't a lot of explanations left. Malice? Stupidity? Conspiracy? Drugs?

At this point, the American government seems intent on igniting a regional war - a conflagration in the Middle East designed to suck in all countries. Norman Podhoretz, one of Giuliani's advisers and head of the gang of neoconservative thugs, says that we're in the midst of World War IV against Islamofascism. Of course, his claim makes about as much sense as the Belgians attacking us after Timothy McVeigh's attack in Oklahoma City. Whatever this is, this is not a battle between nation-states, but this subtle distinction escapes the likes of Podhoretz, Bill Kristol, and Paul Wolfowitz and people (like Bush and Cheney) who think these neocons have a clue about the world. And yet, Podhoretz's view about the world is becoming real - not because it describes something coherent or inevitable but because the leaders of the most powerful country in the world seem to believe him.

Last week, the House Democrats seemed to get to George's secret stash of hallucinogens before he did. They decided to reprimand the Ottoman Empire for its treatment of Armenians a century ago. This while showing itself wildly ineffectual against the atrocities in Darfar. It's rare that I agree with Bush, but I have to agree with him that this is really bad timing. Now, emboldened by their outrage against those self-righteous Americans, the Turks have announced their intention to send troops across the border into Iraq.

Meanwhile, Russian President Putin scolds Condi Rice after making her wait for a meeting, then heads south to meet with Iranian president Ahmadinejad and announce support for Iran's pursuit of nuclear technology. Throughout all this, the Bush administration continues saber rattling, threatening Iran and rebuking Russia.

The entire thing plays out like a poorly plotted conspiracy novel where the one guy who is supposed to save the world from pending doom has been distracted by Viagra and Prozac and is happy to accept his senior officer's suggestion that he just follow orders and not worry about any of this. It's like we're in a Tom Clancy novel but the hero decided to walk across the book store to pursue the heroine of a Harlequin instead, leaving his story to be played out like dada art.

It's no wonder that in the midst of all this, Jon Stewart and Steven Colbert have such high ratings. Absurd is the only thing that can make sense of this. I came across a quote at http://www.overheardinnewyork.com/, a collection of comments overheard in New York. One of these random quotes seems to sum up this period of neo-absurdist policy better than I ever could:

Guy on cell in the Financial District: "So, the ecstasy turned out to be Excedrin."

Putin's Antidote to Global Warming? A Small Dose of Cold War

From Yahoo News
MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russian President Vladimir Putin launched a scathing attack on the West on Thursday, accusing Washington of imperialism and of starting a new arms race.

Moscow has been alarmed by U.S. plans to deploy elements of its global missile defense system in Poland and the Czech Republic. Washington says it wants to avert attacks from "rogue states" such as Iran but Russia sees a threat to its own security.

"There is a clear desire by some international players to dictate their will to everyone without adhering to international law," Putin said. "International law has been replaced by political reasons."

"In our opinion it is nothing different from diktat, nothing different from imperialism," he added.


From Harper's Index

Percentage of top Soviet(or Russian) officials who were drawn from the armed forces or security services
under Mikhail Gorbachev: 5
under Boris Yeltsin: 47
under Vladimir Putin: 78

Boris Yeltsin, Continuing the Tradition of Wretched Russian Government

"Under capitalism, man exploits man. Under communism, it's just the reverse."

Boris Yelstin is dead. He was like a drunk driver who drives the car out of the ditch, shoots across 9 lanes of traffic, and gets stuck in the ditch on the other side. His is a story of wasted opportunity.

For one thing, we sent economists to advise Yeltsin and his country, economists who knew all about how to manage an economy assuming one had savvy business people. We also sent business consultants, people who knew all about how to manage a business assuming a stable economy. It wasn't obvious that anyone knew how to create chickens without eggs or eggs without chickens. In that sense, Russia would have struggled with this, its latest attempt to circumvent the gradual progress of the rest of Europe, a tradition that began with Peter the Great.

Secondly, Yeltsin gave away the state, privatizing large chunks of the economy in a way that favored an elite few. Today, 36 men own 25% of Russia's wealth - a ridiculous concentration of wealth that seems a caricature of the inequality found in the West. This is not the result of entrepreneurship - it is a result of government-sanctioned theft. It is this more than his role as the first elected president of Russia that will be Yeltsin's legacy.

These two issues would have been enough to make Russia a mess. But I suspect that there is a third no one talks about: capitalism died about the same time that communist communities realized that they had a non-working model. Yeltin tried to lead Russia from communism to capitalism late in the 20th century, the equivalent of moving a society from 8-track to cassette just as everyone was buying mp3 players.

The battle between communism and capitalism wasn't a battle over the importance of capital. Both sides saw it as paramount to a working economy. It was Marx's, not Adam Smith's, landmark book that was titled Capital. The battle between capitalists and communists was a battle about who should control capital, the state or the banker. It is true that the banker proved superior to the state and the tyranny of robber barons was harder to maintain than the tyranny of police states. In that sense, Russia was overdue to transform away from communism. But the question is, towards what?

In today's $40 trillion global economy, capital is no longer the limit to progress. In the period of time when the average worker is now a capitalist - when even Sears and GM have become huge bankers - trillions of dollars of capital are sloshing around the globe in search of returns. Capital is essential, but it doesn't limit the development of today's leading economies.

What the leading G-7 communities have done in the last century is create hybrid economies. Most citizens are vested in social security and a 401(k) or pension plan. The state regulates some business activity yet businesses are free to do things that regulators haven't even thought about. Laws that prohibit child labor and regulate work place safety have transformed the world from the late 19th century world of Dickens’s and the robber barons who hired Pinkerton men to beat up or kill union organizers. But these laws do not prohibit bankers and entrepreneurs from creating a greater number and variety of businesses than ever before. The best communities have made government and businesses both accountable by using each, in turn, to call the other into account. The point is not to submit to the tyranny of either, but to play each off against the other in a way that gives the individual a fighting chance. It is, finally, the individual who should be empowered and protected by institutions. Failing that, the community itself eventually fails. It isn't communities that are subordinated to bank or state that succeed but those that manage to subordinate both to the average person.

Russia has a history of contempt for the average person. The imperialism of the Tsar's, the communism of dictators and the democracy of Yeltsin and Putin are governments that share a basic contempt for the rights, freedom, and plight of the individual. Whether Russia adopted communism or capitalism is almost unimportant in comparison to this. Until Russian institutions show genuine regard for the individual, Russian society will continue to be a threat to its citizens and its neighbors. Sadly, that doesn't look likely to happen any time soon.