Corporate media are bringing on leaked Kool Aid not unlike the WMD concoction they offered 18 years ago to \u201cjustify\u201d the U.S.-UK war of aggression on Iraq.<\/p>\n
Now Michael McFaul, ambassador to Russia under President Obama, has been enlisted by The Washington Post<\/i>\u2019s editorial page honcho, Fred Hiatt, to draw on his expertise (read, incurable Russophobia) to help stick President Donald Trump back into \u201cPutin\u2019s pocket.\u201d (This has become increasingly urgent as the canard of \u201cRussiagate\u201d – including the linchpin claim that Russia hacked the DNC – lies gasping for air.)<\/p>\n
In an oped<\/a> on Thursday McFaul presented a long list of Vladimir Putin\u2019s alleged crimes, offering a more ostensibly sophisticated version of amateur Russian specialist, Rep. Jason Crow\u2019s (D-CO) claim that: \u201cVladimir Putin wakes up every morning and goes to bed every night trying to figure out how to destroy American democracy.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n McFaul had – well, let\u2019s call it an undistinguished career in Moscow. He arrived with a huge chip on his shoulder and proceeded to alienate just about all his hosts, save for the rabidly anti-Putin folks he openly and proudly cultivated. In a sense, McFaul became the epitome of what Henry Wooton described as the role of ambassador – \u201can honest man sent to lie abroad for the good of his country.\u201d What should not be so readily accepted is an ambassador who comes back home and just can\u2019t stop misleading.<\/p>\n Not to doubt McFaul\u2019s ulterior motives; one must assume him to be an \u201chonest man\u201d – however misguided, in my opinion. He seems to be a disciple of the James Clapper-Curtis LeMay-Joe McCarthy School of Russian Analysis. <\/p>\n Clapper, a graduate summa cum laude<\/i>, certainly had the Russians pegged! Clapper was allowed to stay as Barack Obama’s director of national intelligence for three and a half years after perjuring himself in formal Senate testimony (on NSA\u2019s illegal eavesdropping). On May 28, 2017 Clapper told<\/a> NBC\u2019s Chuck Todd about \u201cthe historical practices of the Russians, who typically, are almost genetically driven to co-opt, penetrate, gain favor, whatever, which is a typical Russian technique.\u201d<\/p>\n