A Fascist By Any Other Name Still Smells... or A Candid Discussion About Alfred E. Neuman
As more and more information becomes available about when and what exactly the Trump White House knew about General Mike Flynn’s premature discussions with Russian Ambassador, Sergei Kislyak, it is assumed that more and more Republicans will be forced to call for some sort of investigation. Already, hawks in the Senate are amenable to either a House or, more likely, a Senate committee level probe. Unfortunately, history reveals that while investigations of Logan Act violations have often been taken seriously, their consequences have never amounted to anything but a bad joke. Ronald Reagan’s somewhat treacherous negotiations with the Iranians, purposely delaying our hostages’ release was cavalierly forgiven by an all too forgiving Congress.
It is quite predictable that the current group of Republican Trump supplicants, unaccustomed to caring for the public good as they are, will try to keep any investigation “in-house” where they can protect their politically pubescent boss. No matter how much Mr. Trump knew before his inauguration, no matter how involved he and his campaign may have been with the Russians, the current assortment of party hacks, as a group, will certainly defend him. Perhaps, under severe national pressure, a special investigator may be appointed. Unfortunately, if the Bush “Justice Department” is the model for the modern Republican law enforcement agency, instead of someone like “Pretty Boy” Patrick Fitzgerald, he of the Blagojevich fiasco (nailing the governor on one charge, of lying to a federal prosecutor, while his more competent successor succeeded on more than 30 other counts) and his non investigation of Dick Cheney, I would personally prefer someone who can read and write and maybe even count.
The fact that Trump and Secretary Tillerson have had questionable business dealings with the Russians which is de facto with the Russian government, that Flynn is an award winning Putin supporter and that frothing at the mouth Trump voters and cowardly Republican protectors are afraid to have any actual facts revealed, should send a chill down the spine of all American citizens. Consider the fact that Donald Trump is the only president in the last forty years who has been deathly afraid to release his tax information. The fact that he blatantly lied, stating that he would release them after his audit and then, after being elected, admitted he was lying the whole time, did not bother any of his fawning congressmen and senators.
Now, after revealing that Flynn and the Russian ambassador talked about U.S sanctions, the Russian press claims that the two actually did not do so. Whatever they talked about, the whole affair is a Russian propaganda coup by the master KGB agent, Vladimir Putin, incidentally the bromance interest of both Rex Tillerson and Donald Trump. Putin, of course, gets a pass from the Donald for all the Russians and Eastern Europeans that he may have killed during his (according to Trump) innocent KGB career as well as his equally “innocent” rise to power. This, according to the Donald, is because American leaders have done worse things. What he really means is either that W had more people killed in Iraq in the war (that Trump approved of before he disapproved) without stealing any oil or he’s listening to “Trump’s Brain,” the schizoid Steve Bannon and his alternative right proposed globalist conspiracy supposedly led by Papa Bush and his cohorts, Blacks, Jews, Hispanics, Asians, gays, and especially women of all shapes, sizes, and substance.
At the rate this cowardly Republican Congress seems to be decompensating, it is an even bet as to whether they will end up as Americans or fascist followers. They have thus far virtually rubberstamped, a whole cotillion of cabinet members, over half of whom are completely unqualified or unfit for their jobs, something which history will certainly remind the few Republican senators that seem to still have a conscience. I wonder what they and their infantile president will say after they completely dismantle Dodd-Frank and plunge the country into another recession. Actually, I don’t really wonder, do I. Mnuchin, Tillerson, DeVos and other billionaires can make “new” fortunes off of the misery they cause and begin buying up all of those failed business and corporations they purposely destroy. Just ask them! After you’ve had them for a while, “old” fortunes are so boring, you know. As for Donald, I can hear him now: “ What, me lie? Kellyanne, where the hell is my binky and my Mad Magazine?”
Allen Finkelstein, 2/14/17