Whenever world leaders meet, there are invariably stenographers and/or a video recording system in the room to preserve an accurate record of what takes place in the meeting. However, when Putin met with Trump the two agreed in advance to collude on the absence of such a record. They both wanted a situation in which each side could tell their separate tales of what happened, neither of which was true.
After months of questioning whether Moscow interfered in the 2016 presidential election, President Donald Trump raised the explosive topic Friday in his first meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said the men had a “robust and lengthy exchange” on the question of Russian meddling. But Putin denied any involvement, Tillerson said, adding that the Russians had asked for proof that they were to blame for the campaign of cyberattacks—and the secretary of state stressed the need for the two countries to “move forward.”
“It’s not clear to me that we will ever come to some agreed-upon resolution,” said Tillerson, who joined the Trump-Putin meeting along with his Russian counterpart, Sergei Lavrov. He added that improving the U.S.-Russia relationship is “too important not to find a way forward.”
But the Associated Press reported that Lavrov said after the meeting that Trump had accepted Putin’s assurances that the Kremlin had not sought to interfere in the 2016 election—and Putin himself didn’t mention it at all in a brief comment as he moved to his next event, with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe: “I had a very long conversation with the President of the United States. Many issues have piled up: Ukraine, Syria, other problems, some bilateral issues, and once again the fight against terrorism and security measures.”
The back-and-forth did little to lift the cloud that’s hung over Trump since he took office in January—or to clarify whether Trump’s desire for a better relationship with Putin, whom he praised effusively on the campaign trail, will be realized…
From <Politico>
In fact, Putin got everything he wanted, and Trump got only the assertion by Rex Tillerson, winner of Russia’s Man of the Year Award, that Trump had pressed the issue.
Experts David Filipov, Julianne Smith, and Michael McFaul joined Ari Melber to agree that the meeting was a victory for the Russians.
I do not doubt that Trump is smiling, only because Putin used lots of lube.
I see this as a very weak cooperative attempt on both sides to cover-up and move past an act of war against the US, and a Siberian candidate in the White House.
RESIST!!
9 Responses to “Trump Played His Part”
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I can only take exception to the expression “Siberian candidate” as an insult to Siberia, which is where then send “dissidents,” i.e. progressives. I would have to call the Angry Creamsicle a simon pure Muscovian candidate.
(It also breaks my heart to see beautiful Saint Basil’s Cathedral used to symbolize Russia. But I can certainly understand why. Who in his or her right mind would want to look at the Kremlin, or would even remember it having see it only a few times, as boring as it is?)
I’m going to get the mileage out of a GIF I made from Greenpeace unfurling a “Resist & Defend” banner from Trump Tower in Chicago yesterday:
Love it here too!
Horrible!!! and Scary!
Yes, R.E.S.I.S.T.!!!!!!
That Drumpf only played his part, and in my mind a part that he was assigned to by the Russians, is so blatantly obvious that its scary to me, a foreigner; I can’t begin to imagine how scary and frustrating this must be for Americans, i.e. non-Drumpfians.
Drumpf – not Putin as had been assumed – kept everyone else out of the meeting with the exception of Tillerson, who is already up to his neck in Russia-gate manure. No doubt Keith Olbermann will point this out as more proof of Drumpf’s collusion with the Russians tomorrow. They talked far longer than expected, making sure that there was little press coverage afterwards, and even then they couldn’t get their stories straight on the meddling bit, and had diplomatically inexperienced Tillerson make the mistake of having Drumpf tell Putin only (other) Americans were worried about the Russian meddling. Of course Drumpf wasn’t worried about it, he knew about it and welcomed it at the very least. It makes you wonder if it came up in the conversation at all.
But whether Drumpf and Putin discussed it hardly matters. By the time Drumpf gets home and gives his account of the G20 and his talk with Putin in his usual fashion, it will have been the best ever, and he’ll have scolded Putin for meddling and warned him never to do that again or else…
Was there ever any doubt that a KGB Agent was going to play a (failed) real estate agent like a fiddle?
Tillerson, why would I believe anything this POS says. As CEO of ExxonMobile he denied, and funded denial of, global warming; as Rumpy’s boy he’s going to play Rumpy’s game, who, in turn is Putin’s pawn!
Drumpf was so busy ingratiating himself with Putin, he can’t see nor understand what he is doing to the US on the world stage. He wants to be Mr Big but he is demonstrating anything but. And there is no doubt in my mind that Putin knows he has Drumpf by the balls. Drumpf must go!
Resist and Persist!!!
Thanks and AMEN to all!