President Donald J. Trump seems hell-bent on alienating as many American allies as possible. His presidency was only hours old when he put Australia in his crosshairs. Now working his way through the alphabet, the president has tweeted proudly that he’s the reason many of the Middle East’s Arab countries are freezing out Qatar as a hotbed of terrorism.
Except that Qatar is the site of an American military base from which we launch our airborne stand against ISIS. Meanwhile, buddy-buddy Saudi Arabia is where most of the 9/11 terrorists came from. A complex situation, n’est pas? And complexity is not Trumpet’s strong suit. ...
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Read MoreWith so many accomplishments in the first 100 days of Donald J. Trump’s presidency – the immigration ban, the defunding of sanctuary cities, repeal and replace, infrastructure improvement, education reform, jobs for miners and other disaffected workers and the building of the Mexican wall, oh, wait, that stuff didn’t happen – it’s no wonder that Russkiegate was put on the back burner. When you’re sending Syria a calling card in the form of 59 Tomahawk missiles and aircraft carriers in the direction of South Korea – eventually – it’s easy to see how the Russian hacking scandal and possible ties to the Trump administration might seem like ancient history. ...
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Read MoreIf you’re a lover of storytelling – as any writer is – the Russian hacking scandal is a great story.
And like any great story, it’s filled with conflict, complexity, intrigue and ambiguity. Just about the only thing everyone agrees on – sort of – is that the Democrats were hacked by the Russians. This is not news. We heard about it all during the campaign, when Donald Trump alternately debunked or doubted it.
What is new is that the CIA has concluded that the Russians did this deliberately to aid Trump. Sens. John McCain and Lindsey Graham have vowed to investigate, because if there’s one thing Congress hates – even more than cooperating with President Barack Obama, who has called for a full investigation – is Ruskies, especially Ruskies led by Vladimir “Rootin’ Tootin’” Putin. ...
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