TERRY MOSHER
The November 8 election of Donald Trump as president is the day the Russians stole America and democracy was nearly destroyed. Yes, we all got it all wrong. We didn’t just elect a man that has strong financial ties to Russia; we elected a man who is in collusion with the Russians to take over the most powerful country ever assembled.
Somewhere between 1987 when Trump first visited Moscow to pursue business deals and 2008 when Donald Jr. was there making deals for the Trump Brand and Nov. 9, 2013 when Trump took the Miss Universe Pageant to Moscow, he got comprised and an arrangement was solidified with Putin and his oligarchy to run for president.
The best guess is that arrangement was first broached in 1987 when Trump’s financial empire was in danger of collapsing from huge debts stemming from his purchase of the Taj Mahal Casino in Atlantic City. That’s when the Russian mob reached out to him and poured money not just into the Taj Mahal Casino but other ventures that Trump had investments.
Trump was fined $10 million in 2015 for money laundering in connection with the Taj Mahal, but the money laundering involving Trump and the Russians are all over the globe, most notably through a Cyprus Bank.
To be fair, Trump is an equal opportunity businessman. He also has strong financial ties to the American Mob (the Mafia).
So, yes, the on-going investigation into Trump and his Russian ties will hopefully continue and be allowed to survive, but that is just the tip of the iceberg. Those financial entanglements and likely indiscretions with Russian girls in Moscow have comprised him and allowed Russia leaders and later for Putin and his oligarchy to persuade Trump to run for U.S. President with the carrot in this arrangement that he would be allowed unfettered access to Russian markets for his growing empire in return for Russia to gain control of the U.S. government.
Don’t laugh. Trump has no love for anything America unless it financial is a benefit to him and massages his vast ego. He has no moral compass or empathy or love for anything other than himself.
A perfect storm arrived in 2016 when the Republicans put up a bunch of neophytes that were easy pickin’s in the primary for a man like Trump who is the king of conmen, and Hillary Clinton was fresh meat for a hungry tiger like Trump and his Russian cohorts in the presidential campaign. They colluded to run fake stories on Clinton and she was no match for the King of conmen, who had his loyal supporters chanting, “Lock her up, lock her up.”
Still, the Russians didn’t have a lot of confidence that their man would be able to pull it off. But a good consolation if Clinton won as everybody expected is that she would be severely damaged by the fake stories and her presidency would be weakened enough and U.S. democracy stained enough that the Russians would be strengthen in their battle with America for world domination.
Now there are reports that Russian money laundering was extended to the Republican Party during the presidential campaign with the acknowledgment of leaders like Paul Ryan, Jeff Sessions and Mitch McConnell and even vice president Mike Pence.
So the truth is we should be looking past the financial ties. The Russians are gaining control of our government through the actions of Republican leaders and Trump. Don’t look at just the actions they are doing to erase the presidency of Obama, but look at what systems ‑ the checks and balances of our government that allows it to be a democracy ‑ have been weakened because the end result for Trump and the Russians is to make it easier for the coup to survive.
In that end, Trump has yet to fill many empty positions in the government, has attacked the judicial and the justice system and the media and has suggested that congressional rules must be eliminated or changed to allow for the president to better enact his wishes, thus strengthening the president.
Now it’s a race for Trump to cover up the cover-up and erase as many threats remaining to this coup as possible before any investigation becomes public and the tide is turned against him and the Russians.
Our one big hope is that the FBI can remain strong and united while under attack from Trump and the Russians and reveal all the truth. There would still be a major hurdler before he could be removed because the leadership of the Rs has been comprised and they will not be eager to throw their considerable weight behind an impeachment.
Bottom line is we are under attack from Russia and our democracy that was stolen on Nov. 9 is either going to be finished or it somehow will have enough breath left to summon one last great effort to save itself.
We’ll see soon.