From Russia with love: why the Kremlin backs Trump

The Kremlin can’t believe its luck,” said Konstantin von Eggert, an independent Moscow-based political analyst who believes the Obama administration has not been forceful in countering Russia.

President Obama and (Secretary of State) John Kerry were a dream team for them, but now they have an even better option; someone who thinks that America should have nothing to do with the rest of the world.

Perhaps the Kremlin can’t believe its luck, when the US is about to elect Donald Trump the POTUS. But the Kremlin is not lucky in that Trump is an isolationist–the Kremlin is lucky that Trump is a businessman and not a leader.

A lot can be said about Putin, but it can not be said that he is not a leader–Trump, so far in his bid for the POTUS, has not shown that he is a leader.

Trump knows who his customers are in the Republican base–but doesn’t understand how to lead from that position. Trump is not an isolationist, but his customers are. Trump may know who his customers are, but how is he going to lead them when he doesn’t believe in their movement?

The Kremlin should be thankful for the fact that Trump is a businessman. The Kremlin can use as many customers as the businessmen Trump is willing to give them. When Trump the businessman meet with Putin he will have a whole briefcase full of customers.

The Kremlin, under the Putin leadership, knows how to deal with businessmen, their business model depends on it. Putin has said the he will build an Industrial Military Complex and to accomplish that he needs customers.

Dealing with leaders, such as Obama, Hillary, or Bernie Sanders is another thing. Leaders are behind (or infront) of a movement and are hard to control–businessmen are not. Businessmen are not necessarily leaders, but to be successful, they must know their customers and they must know how to deal in cash. For leaders to be successful they need to be ahead or behind a movement of people.

“It must be money you brought, to better haggle with us on key issues,” Putin joked, looking across the table at a smiling Kerry.

Source: What’s briefcase?

When Trump’s Secretary of State visits Putin, the briefcase will be full of money, as Putin expected. Businessmen know that there is a price for every customer, and Trump, I am sure, will be more than happy to buy into what Putin is selling, i.e. leadership, as long as Trump gets to put his name on it.

Source: From Russia with love: why the Kremlin backs Trump – To Inform is to Influence

zenpundit.com » Blog Archive » Patterns, Language, and Knowledge

The potential energy of the loop is built in observation and slowly (or not) released throughout the loop until it jumps the gap between decision and action. The kinetic energy is released as a spark in revolution, or a slow burn in evolution, depending on what fills the gap. The potential is totally released in Action as it penetrates, isolates, subverts, re-orients, and reharmonizes itself into another potential

Perhaps another way of looking at this is buried within my comment I made today from the post.

Hey Scott, thanks for posting.
I thought about ordering the book, but it seems to me that judgement depends a lot on positioning. In other words, positioning comes out of the decisions your orientation make and judgement ultimately comes out of how firm the position is that you hold. I guess recognising the spiral is recognising that position.
On that point, I would be interested in what the book says about precision and accuracy.

I think my second quote means the same as the first that I have been doing some thinking about it since then.

Maybe, “depending on what fills the gap” depends on if what fills the gap is the scales of justice?

 

Source: zenpundit.com » Blog Archive » Patterns, Language, and Knowledge

Election 2016, American Democracy at Risk; Technology Is Used to Drive Extreme

And, in doing so, they acted in a fundamentally undemocratic manner by preventing Trump from exercising his right to free speech (regardless of what one thinks of the content of that speech) as well as those of his audience who sought to exercise their right of free assembly.

Really? What exactly wasn’t Trump not allowed to say? I mean if he had been at the rally, wouldn’t his speach been very similar to what he said afterwords? Or would he had told his audience that violence was unacceptable?

As for his audience being denied the right of free assembly. It looked pretty free to me. Who exactly, other than Trump wasn’t allowed (or needed) to assemble, and wasn’t allowed to assemble?

There may have been many of his supporters who were not allowed to assemble and it may have been that Trump wasn’t allowed free speech, but I don’t believe these guys have made their case, if it took more than a community, instead of one guy, to write this article.

Source: Election 2016, American Democracy at Risk; Technology Is Used to Drive Extreme | Michael Harris PhD | LinkedIn

The Obama Doctrine: The President Isn’t a Realist, He’s an Isolationist

The devil is in the execution. In Obama’s mind, the Syrian Civil War does not constitute a direct threat; nor does Vladimir Putin’s lunge into Ukraine. For Obama, as Goldberg paraphrases No. 44, “the Middle East is no longer terribly important to American interests”; even if it were, “an American president could do little to make it a better place.” All told, in Goldberg’s words, Obama believes that the “the price of direct U.S. action would be higher than the price of inaction.”Realism is more complicated. A realist knows that distant threats, if ignored, can turn into direct ones. Hence, the “precautionary principle”—better to act than wait in the face of risks not fully known—that is so dear to climate warriors like Obama serves as another pillar of the realist faith.

A realist also knows that the international system, like nature, abhors a vacuum. So ambitious rivals will interpret inaction as invitation. Even that ur-isolationist Thomas Jefferson grasped the simplest rule of realism: Power calls for counter-power. “None of us wish to see Bonaparte conquer Russia,” he wrote in 1814. “This done, England would be but a breakfast. … It cannot be to our interest that all Europe should be reduced to a single monarchy.”

First, I am not sure what the author means, when he says Obama isn’t being realistic. It seems to me that Obama is being very realistic, at least  in his actions, if not policy.

The Romans had a word for it: principiis obsta, meaning “resist the beginnings” to avoid an unpleasant end. Syria is a perfect case study. Obama drew his vaunted “red line” over the use of chemical weapons in Syria before Bashar al-Assad massacred civilians with sarin, a nerve gas, in 2013. But instead of making true on the threat of an American military response, Obama pulled back and invited the Russians in, never mind that Henry Kissinger had essentially kicked them out of the Middle East in the 1970s—pushing them out of Egypt, Russia’s main stronghold in the region, by bringing then-President Anwar al-Sadat into the American camp. Mr. Putin was delighted to oblige Mr. Obama, and there went 40 years of American primacy in the world’s most critical arena.

Second, is it being very realistic resiting the beginnings? If you are calling something the beginnings, are you not understanding the realism of the situation? To resist or not is another decision, and it could be that all this war we have been having in the Middle East has taught us something.

The Syrian war was started, at least in part, by the battle for water. So how is the US going to influence that war and it doesn’t seem to be our problem, until we choose sides in the battle for water. As yet it doesn’t appear to me that we have chosen a side in the battle for water.

Is Obama overseeing the self-containment, or “self-disempowerment,” of the mightiest nation on earth?

You can only isolate yourself, or any other person or group by building a fence, not a barrier, and so far, Obama and the BushII administrations have only built self-disempowerment barriers that can be crossed.

It should be noted that Bush lost his chance to isolate the Iraqi military when he sent them home, as they were not considered our enemy.

So why now is ISIS our enemy?

Source: The Obama Doctrine: The President Isn’t a Realist, He’s an Isolationist – The Atlantic

Trump explains tweeting Mussolini quote

Trump posted the tweet early Sunday morning from @ilduce2016: “It is better to live one day as a lion than 100 years as a sheep.”

Let’s hope Trump has as good of day as Obama did. But then what else is a Christian for?

When is the Florida primary?

Source: Trump explains tweeting Mussolini quote

The Latest: Trump Says ‘I Don’t Care’ About Iowa Dispute

Trump, who on Wednesday was accusing Cruz of election fraud and calling for an Iowa do-over, told CNN’s Anderson Cooper that he’s so focused on the Feb. 9 contest in New Hampshire that “I don’t care about that anymore.”

Don’t care?

Wait a minute, Trump is helping to elect the next POTUS and he doesn’t care? #fail

Source: The Latest: Trump Says ‘I Don’t Care’ About Iowa Dispute – ABC News

US Air Force shelves Warthog plane retirement amid IS fight: media

Washington (AFP) – The US Air Force will delay retiring the A-10 — a stalwart attack aircraft beloved by ground troops — because of the ongoing fight against the Islamic State group, a military news site reported Wednesday.

So basically, the USA is going to invade Iraq as it did Afghanistan, i.e. it will eliminate the competing insurgency, ISIS, with Iraqi troops. The significant factor will be that these troops will be Arab instead of Iranian.

Doing the same thing and expecting different results is the definition of insanity.

In other words, we are creating another Afghanistan.

While those already  fighting in Afghanistan will be ahead of the curve, I wonder about the POTUS nominations. Will they be prepared?

Another 10 years in Iraq?

Source: US Air Force shelves Warthog plane retirement amid IS fight: media – Yahoo News

Special Forces Raiding Islamic State Positions, Says Iraqi Official – Yahoo News

Consequently, this strategy is undermining ISIS rather than strengthening it.”

Yes but it looks like Spartacus is killing his horse. ” The company could be worth as much as $2.5 trillion, according to financial analysts.”, which could go a long way in boosting that strategy. I guess it is about who is willing to buy in. Does this story mean that the Special Forces are buying in?

I don’t think the author really says, as it is out of the Arab media, and they would not be in a position to know of such matters, unless it was expressed by their leaders.

Source: Special Forces Raiding Islamic State Positions, Says Iraqi Official – Yahoo News

House approves bill to allow people to keep insurance

WASHINGTON — The U.S. House approved, in a 261-157 vote Friday, a GOP proposal to allow insurers to continue offering health care plans to new and existing customers through next year, even if the plans do not meet new federal requirements.

So the Republican held House has decided to pay for the improvements to Obamacare.

Now I wonder how they are going to pay for the “improvements” a lower quality care system is going to cost.

Like always, the MSM is clueless to the questions to ask and  that need to be answered, in order for Obamacare to work.

via House approves bill to allow people to keep insurance.

Pay-Go?

The Republican held House has a decision to make. It can say that Obamacare is not as bad as House Republicans now claim, pay to have it fixed as they have done in the past, or take some of the wealth of a future generation and pay for Obamacare.

Of course there is always the option of revolution. Like the Tea Party of old, the new Tea Party knows revolutions.

You take the junk out of the holds of the ships and throw it into the sea.

Of course those “holds” are now in the ships of past honor residing in the House, the fear now in Republicans who don’t want to pay for it, and the interest in the wealth that future generations hold.

The domains of war, which let’s face it that is what a revolution really needs, are honor, fear and interest.

What I am trying to say, that is just something to be “highlighted”   🙂