Trump’s
Worst Collusion Isn’t With Russia — It’s With
Corporations
The billionaires who backed Trump are making out
a lot better than Putin.
By Peter Certo
July 14,
2017 "Information
Clearing House"
- I’ve always been a little skeptical that
there’d be a smoking gun about the Trump
campaign’s alleged collusion with Russia. The
latest news about Donald Trump, Jr., however, is
tantalizingly close.
The short version of the story,
revealed by emails
the New York Times obtained, is that
the president’s eldest son was offered “some
official documents and information that would
incriminate Hillary” and “would be very useful
to your father.”
More to
the point, the younger Trump was explicitly
told this was “part of Russia and its
government’s support for Mr. Trump.” Donald,
Jr.’s reply? “I love it.”
Trump
Jr. didn’t just host that meeting at Trump
Tower. He also brought along campaign manager
Paul Manafort and top Trump confidante (and
son-in-law) Jared Kushner.
We
still don’t have evidence they coordinated with
Russian efforts to release Clinton campaign
emails, spread “fake news,” or hack state voting
systems. But at the very least, the top members
of Trump’s inner circle turned up to get
intelligence they knew was part of a
foreign effort to meddle in the election.
Some in Washington are convinced they’ve heard
enough already, with Virginia senator (and
failed VP candidate) Tim Kaine calling the
meeting “treason.”
Perhaps. But it’s worth asking: Who’s done the
real harm here? Some argue it’s not the Russians
after all.
“The effects of the crime are undetectable,” the
legendary social critic
Noam Chomsky says
of the alleged
Russian meddling, “unlike the massive effects of
interference by corporate power and private
wealth.”
That’s
worth dwelling on.
Many
leading liberals suspect, now with a
little more evidence, that Trump worked with
Russia to win his election. But we’ve long
known that huge corporations and wealthy
individuals threw their weight behind the
billionaire.
That
gambit’s paying off far more handsomely for them
— and more destructively for the rest of us —
than any scheme by Putin.
The
evidence is hiding in plain sight.
The top priority in Congress right now is to
move a health bill that would gut Medicaid and
throw at least 22 million Americans off their
insurance — while loosening regulations on
insurance companies and cutting taxes on the
wealthiest by
over $346 billion.
|
No
Advertising
- No
Government
Grants
-
This
Is
Independent
Media
|
As few as
12 percent of Americans
support that bill, but the allegiance of its
supporters isn’t to voters — it’s plainly to the
wealthy donors who’d get those tax cuts.
Meanwhile,
majorities of Americans
in every single congressional district
support efforts to curb local pollution, limit
carbon emissions, and transition to wind and
solar. And majorities in every single state
back the Paris climate agreement.
Yet even as scientists warn large parts of the
planet could soon become uninhabitable, the
fossil fuel-backed Trump administration has put
a climate denier in charge of the EPA, pulled
the U.S. out of Paris, and signed legislation to
let coal companies
dump toxic ash in local waterways.
Meanwhile, as the administration escalates the
unpopular Afghan war once again, Kushner invited
billionaire military contractors
— including Blackwater founder Erik Prince — to
advise on policy there.
Elsewhere, JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon and other
architects of the housing crash are advising
Trump on
financial deregulation,
while student debt profiteers
set policy at
the Department of Education.
Chomsky
complains that this sort of collusion
is often “not considered a crime but the normal
workings of democracy.” While Trump has taken it
to new heights, it’s certainly a bipartisan
problem.
If
Trump’s people did work with Russia to undermine
our vote, they should absolutely be held
accountable. But the politicians leading the
charge don’t have a snowball’s chance of
redeeming our democracy unless they’re willing
to take on the corporate conspirators much
closer to home.
Peter
Certo is the editorial manager of the Institute
for Policy Studies and the editor of
OtherWords.org.
This
article was first published by
OtherWords
-
See
also -
How the Clintons
Longstanding Ukrainian Donor Allegedly Sponsored
Hillary's Run
The
views expressed in this article are solely those
of the author and do not necessarily reflect the
opinions of Information Clearing House.
