Trump definitely acts like a person that Putin has a hold over. If he had, the only question is what this “hold” is.
My bet: A video of Trump happily banging a minor (or even several) in a Moscow hotel room. It would perfectly fit his personal profile, him being a “friend” of Epstein.
Nah, it has to be money. No way something like that would ruin Trump at this point.
From my perspective, this doesn’t seem very complicated. Putin is rumored to be the richest (now second or third richest) man in the world. Elon gave what would have previously been well within Putin’s budget and look at the absolute subjugation Trump is willing to put up with. This was always a quid pro quo, but Trump doesn’t operate on Kompromat. In my opinion, it’s just buying favor because it literally is that transactional. Trump will only rip you off if he thinks he can get away with it unscathed.
Doesnt this assume that if it weren’t for evil people giving trump money, that he would be a good person?
I would say anyone looking for buyers on favor is inherently a bad person, especially if those favors are always anti-“the one thing you’re supposed to do”
At this point, I really do believe the guy could step onto timesquare and just kill a bunch of people, and his voters would still do the mental gymnastics to explain all of that away as the act of a genius businessman just out there to save your average white suburbanite slob. If they even believed it in the first place, the probability of which is quite low.
So yeah, no, that seems quite unlikely.
Cult. MAGA is a cult.
A KGB rep already said Trump has “obligations” he needs to fulfill.
Just to play devils advocate, they do this to ‘stir the pot.’ Granted, Putin’s hand is up Trump’s ass to the shoulder.
Once again, for the cheap seats - the US lost the third world war which was waged in the shadows and online. China and Russia installed this fucking nutter both times. Biden won in 2020 because enough folks got off their asses to vote, but the disinformation and propaganda run during Bidens term led to less asses going to the polls. Musk didn’t buy twitter and hollow it out for nyucks. He was directed to do so by China, Russia, and the UAE. Look at the public filings for his purchase. Look at who gave Musk the money for that purchase. Twitter was such a powerful tool to spread or combat disinformation and propaganda, so it was purchased and gutted in order to be used the another nail in the coffin of progressive collective action. Twitter under musk was such a huge part of drumpf 2024 winning.
To be honest and a bit pedantic, it’s a continuation of the cold war. There has been no 3rd world war and likely as not due to; Russia’s complete mishandling of their nuclear arsenal and China’s economic interests, there is little threat of one. The US intelligence departments know this. And with Gabbard as the DNI Chief I’m pretty sure Russia has a finger on the pulse of what we will know. There are rumblings of compartmentalization efforts in the Intelligence communities and there are rumors of rogue efforts to keep sensitive intel within the DOD and subsequent cells and away from the DNI and the Executive branch. We’re living in absolutely insane times and the US Hegemony is at it’s most vulnerable now. I am not for US Hegemony in the general sense and I do not think that it is the only stabilizing force in world politics. But when a power vacuum forms, it’s rare that stability follows in the short term.
If there were ever a time for a general strike to depose and defang the executive branch it is now. However, I don’t see the general US populace doing anything on behalf of Ukraine or to further the Hegemony.
With what Musk is allowing DOGE to do we’re headed for another great recession. Maybe that will be the inciting event to have a revolution. But I just don’t know. The Constitution setup the branches of the government in such a naive way. There are no true checks and balances, just gentleman’s agreements to “behave in the best interests of the country”. To wit, the Constitution was designed to be a living document to be amended and changed to fit the current society it governs, but this has not been the case. Impeachment does nothing, we have a convicted felon in the White House and a foreign born national directing policy. These are uncharted waters but I don’t think anything short of a general strike will change anything.
Yeah I agree on all your points. I like to call it ww3 bc “but US won Cold War, no more Berlin Wall”. Also ww3 sounds scarier and I want people to freak out in a real way.
Fair enough, like I said the point I made was pedantic. Your points stand regardless of if it’s called WW3 or anything else.
Btw the first word of ur username should be correct
I couldn’t justify putting correct in my username on Lemmy. But I loved the reference too much not to use it, so here I am, a less secure truncated version of a better password.
did we just become best friends?
Wanna build bunk beds? You can have top bunk. Mom still has me with rubber sheets.
The crazy part of this is how many people on here will agree with this in principle, but then turn around and repeat propaganda about Biden. The same exact thing they did with Clinton. The playbook is so obvious to anyone who has not become emotionally invested in denying that they got taken by this Russian agitprop.
Not that much of a mystery, really. Putin has had Donnie’s nuts in a vise since the 80s.
lazy, and incorrect bullshit
I’d love for you to post some non lazy sources.
Are you a correct horse battery staple or an incorrect horse battery staple?
I couldn’t justify putting correct in my username on Lemmy. But I loved the reference too much not to use it, so here I am, a less secure truncated version of a better password.
FWIW, I think you’re the correct variety of horse battery staple.
I guess people didn’t get your reference: https://xkcd.com/936/
protip: there is no russian kompramat. never was. it’s headline grabbing laziness. donald trump was born a nyc construction scion raised equally in both the kkk and mafia. trump perfers russian strongmen and fascists, he thinks democracy is weak and worthless. there’s no gotcha. trump does what he wants because it pleases him. that it. this was always the fight. if the million dead from a purposefully inept covid response didn’t tell you that last time, i don’t know if there anything anyone can say. in a free, fair, and safe (last?) election young democrats couldn’t be bothered to cast a ballot for the continuation of democracy, and so we get fascist disassembly instead
trump does what he wants because it pleases him.
It’d oddly coincidental that it always happens to please Putin too. Also go back to that Helsinki meeting and look at the body language. Trump’s is a display of cringing submissiveness that is not consistent with it just being an alignment of interest. Trump is shit-scared of Putin for some reason, kompromat or not.
There is no kompramat that’s been proven, however Trump is very happy to take Russian money to further Russian interests. It’s the same with the Saudis and Israelis. The US government is for sale.
https://www.newsweek.com/full-list-countries-made-payments-donald-trump-during-presidency-1858008
Because it hasn’t been released.
“The context for this footnote comes from a discussion of the conversation Trump had with Comey during the presidential transition about the Steele dossier, the original source of the pee tape allegations. According to Steele’s dossier, a source alleged that Russians had a tape of compromising material from a 2013 trip to Moscow in which Trump watched prostitutes engage in sexual acts. One part of that sexual encounter allegedly included “golden showers.” Comey would say later that Trump had become obsessed with the sexual allegations in the Steele dossier, despite those allegations being not the criminally incriminating ones, and raised it “at least four times” with the then head of the FBI.”
There is no kompramat that’s been proven,
i.e there may be kompramat but we do not know. Likely we will never know. However, we do know Trump is for sale to the highest bidder.
there’s a good documentary about trump’s ny shit on yt that’s easy to find that’s all about this
My theory (and not just mine) is that, in the 80s, Trump ratted out the NY mafia to SDNY, and that’s why he was protected from prosecution for his many crimes after that. The collapse of Gotti and co. led to the Russian mob getting much more power.
The narrative was that trump might turn on putin, because Russia is doing terribly on the war front. That seemed possible, but Trump is so easily influenced he bought in to the Russian propaganda the second Putin talked to him.
Trump turns on everybody, but he’s never turned on Putin. I don’t think there was ever a possibility Trump was going to go against Russia, the source of that was probably people around Trump who are less subservient to Putin.
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I’ll blame the voters every time. Not just this election. It’s the yearly elections, the local ones that cover local and state elections. The not showing up has allowed the long game of the republicans who are good at getting people to show up. This is on the regular of people “not paying attention to politics.” And them voting local is what pushes the upper. How do you think Trump took over the party?
So yes, gonna blame the voters.
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Yeah, I hate responses like this. You’re in the heart of the empire, you ain’t getting to choose between Clark Kent and Lex Luthor.
There was only two outcomes and it was our job to pick the less shitty outcome.
End of story.
Americans really are still pushing this hyper-exceptionalism narrative to try and blame the Dems
This was a group effort. The third party voters and the people who stayed at home have just as much blame for this crap.
They need to own their shit and realize that you don’t always get what you want, sometimes you have to do what you can with what you have.
Murica
I was pretty astounded to learn a significant number of Muslims voted for the guy who clearly did not want Muslims entering the county last time around, because they were told Democrats were continuing to arm Israel and thus supported Israel. Which is somewhat true, but because everyone thinks in black and white terms, they decided to believe that “Trump wants to make peace” meant he was going to get everyone to stand down, when the reality is that Trump doesn’t give a shit about Palestinians any more than he ever did, and peace to him means getting rid of the Muslims and turning Gaza into a resort for Israelis.
I was pretty astounded to learn a significant number of Muslims voted for the guy
The stories were mainly about Arab-Americans, a narrow majority of whom are Christian (Maronite, Orthodox and Coptic). And the majority of Muslim-Americans have little to no connection or solidarity with the Palestinians.
But the press is too lazy to pick up on these nuances, just as it never reports on the Israelis’ relentless attacks on Palestinian Christians. The media narrative is Israelis versus Muslims, and that’s all you hear about.
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It’s not a zero-sum blame-game. We can be angry at both.
Yes and, better candidates get more voters. The DNC did not address rising costs when they had the most power to do so. They didn’t run primaries even though a very unpopular incumbent was not doing well in press conferences months before the debates. Then when they did offer up another candidate they did not differentiate themselves from the unpopular policies of the incumbent.
It was so frustrating to watch.
And at the end of it, the people who just wanted complicit silence from a fed up electorate will blame everyone who was unhappy.
Kamala 100% addressed rising costs by saying we needed to outlaw price gouging on groceries. That Medicaid should cover in-home care. By giving tax credits for children. By giving tax credits for home ownership and starting a new business.
She addressed this a lot and had a lot of things she wanted to do to curb it. I’m tired of that talking point. Shows how little people paid attention.
Yeah, we didn’t get proper primaries. It sucks
I’m still blaming the people who stayed at home or voted third party just as much as I’m blaming maga.
Ignorant, self absorbed citizens who don’t care who gets hurt if they don’t get what they want.
Over it.
Yeah. But if you supported the alternative, you’re a genocide supporting false progressive blue or nothing scab. In all caps sometimes. Get criticized for calling out the sitouts in one thread, then in another they claim they voted Kamala anyway.
Seriously, I think these guys are running on a script.
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“Scaramucci did not elaborate on what he believes that “hold” might be, adding only: “I don’t know why it’s like this. [H.R.] McMaster couldn’t figure it out, [James] Mattis couldn’t figure it out, [John] Kelly couldn’t figure it out.”
We know for a fact, thanks to the Mueller Report, that the Pee Tapes mentioned in the Steele Dossier do, in fact, exist. They’re fake, but they exist.
"According to a footnote in the special counsel’s report, which was released Thursday, Michael Cohen, Trump’s former personal lawyer, received a text from Russian businessman Giorgi Rtskhiladze in October 2016 that said: “Stopped flow of tapes from Russia but not sure if there’s anything else. Just so you know…”
Rtskhiladze also told prosecutors that he was told the tapes were fake, but that he didn’t convey that to Cohen.
Well he was given a wife…
Sorry, which one(s) was that?
Need more than hints and vague language, we all know it’s true, but release the peepe tapes now
This is the difference between the DNC and the GOP. Both parties know that the PeePee tapes exist and are fake, however the GOP would have released them in 2017 regardless of if they were real or not. Much like the trumping up of Hillary’s email server and Bengazi. It’s not about what’s true or real anymore. It’s about public sentiment. That’s how Russian and Chinese misinformation are so successful here. We’ve defunded our schools and have people struggling so much to make ends meet they cannot take the time off to vote, and when they do vote they’re often not really looking at anything else than how much groceries and gasoline cost. Which pointedly, the Executive branch has little control over.
We’ve been fucked since Reagan. John Hinckly Jr. frankly should have had more firearms training.
https://archive.ph/Q2DvN no paywall
Oh wow, a wild Mucci appears!
I don’t think Scaramucci knows shit about fuck
Today’s word is: Kompromat