The attempted Clinton-CIA coup against Donald Trump

[David Guyatt]

Trump and the Media 9
21 Jan, 2017 in Uncategorized by craig | View Comments
With no sense of irony, a "liberal" media which rightly excoriates the President of Gambia for failing to accept an election result, continues to do precisely the same thing in the case of Donald Trump. No invective is too strong to be cast against a man whose election the "liberal" media did everything possible to prevent.


With the happy resignation of Stephen Daisley, a strong contender for worst journalist in the World is now Jonathan Freedland of the Guardian. He takes the irony to an entirely new level. He claims that Trump will destroy the legacy by which smaller nations "long looked to the US to maintain something close to a rules-based international system." He completely ignores the fact that the greatest single hammer blow against the rules based international system was delivered by Freedland's idol Tony Blair, when he supported the invasion of Iraq without a Security Council Resolution and in the specific knowledge that, if the matter of force were properly put to the Security Council, it would not merely meet three vetoes but lose a majority vote.


The UN, and the rule of international law, have never recovered from that hammer blow, which Freedland enthusiastically cheered on. Nor has Freedland apparently noticed that the smaller nations rather detest than worship the USA. It has invaded and bombed them, interfered in their elections, supported right wing coups and armies, run destabilising CIA drug rings in them, and armed and even sometimes led dictatorial death squads. Look at all those US Security Council vetoes and the resolutions that never got to a vote because of threatened US vetoes. Look at all those General Assembly votes that were everyone against the USA, Israel and the poor occupied Marshall Islands. Freedland's hymn to the Pax Americana is a sick joke. For much of the world, a period of American isolationism would be extremely welcome.


I am thankfully too clear-headed to like Trump because of the extraordinary campaign of vilification to which he has been subjected. Freedland has no shame about repeating the lie that Trump kept Hitler's speeches by his bedside. I was in a position to know for sure that the "Russian hacking" elements of the extraordinary "Manchurian candidate" rubbish which the entire establishment threw at Trump was definitively untrue. I had the background and training to see that the Christopher Steele dossier was not only nonsense, but a fake, not in fact produced seriatim on the dates claimed. The involvement of the US security services in spreading lies as intelligence to undermine an incoming President will go down as a crucial moment in US history. We have not yet seen the denouement of that story.


But none of that makes Trump a good person. He could be an appalling monster and still be subjected to dirty tricks by other very bad people. There is much about Trump to dislike. His sensible desire for better relations with Russia is matched by a stupid drive to goad China.


Trump's anti-immigrant rhetoric did tap in to the populist racism which is unfortunately sweeping developed countries at the moment. The very wealthy have succeeded in diverting justified anger at the results of globalisation on to immigrant populations, who are themselves victims of globalisation. By shamelessly tapping in to the deep wells of popular atavism, the elite have managed the extraordinary trick of escaping the wrath their appalling profiteering and extreme levels of wealth should bring. His words on race in his inauguration address were good, but does he really mean them? His anti-Muslim rhetoric remains deeply troubling. His ludicrous boast yesterday that he would end radical Islamic terrorism is precisely indicative of the counter-productive stupidity that feeds it.


I am a free trader and dislike the march of protectionism. But on the other hand, international trade agreements have become routinely not about tariffs but much more about the allocation of resources within the states concerned, mandating a neo-liberal model and giving extraordinary legal status to multinational companies. The collapse of the current model of international trade agreement, if that is what Trump really heralds, has both its positive and negative aspects.


It is of course a major question whether the establishment and his own Republican party allow him to do anything too radical at all. My own suspicion is that after all the huffing and puffing, nothing much is going to change. The key intra-party battle will probably be over the only policy he affirmed in any detail yesterday, the return of New Deal type state infrastructure spending. The idea of a massive state funded programme of national infrastructure, particularly in transport, to get heavy industry back on its feet, is the very antithesis of neo-liberalism. I think yesterday cleared up the question of whether Trump really meant it he does. Will he e allowed to do it by a party committed to small state and balanced budgets is a huge question. As Trump is also committed to tax cuts, it implies a massive budget deficit with which Trump might well be comfortable. If Trump does succeed, it could fundamentally shift the way western governments look at economics, turning back the clock to the happier days before the advent of monetarism.


So that is Trump. Much that is bad but some fascinating things to watch. I suppose the reason I can't join in the "it's a disaster" screams, is that I thought it was already a disaster. The neo-liberal, warmongering orthodoxies did not have my support, despite Obama's suave veneer. The pandering to racist populism of Trump is bad, and we must keep a watch on it. He may turn out not really to be different at all. Like all politicians, personal enrichment will doubtless be high on his agenda. But I do not start from the presumption the world is now a worst place than it was last week. I shall wait and see.

Source

[Lauren Johnson]

I had breakfast recently with a friend who's a former Republican member of Congress. Here's what he said:
Him: Trump is no Republican. He's just a big fat ego.
Me: Then why didn't you speak out against him during the campaign?
Him: You kidding? I was surrounded by Trump voters. I'd have been shot.
Me: So what now? What are your former Republican colleagues going to do?
Him (smirking): They'll play along for a while.
Me: A while?
Him: They'll get as much as they want tax cuts galore, deregulation, military buildup, slash all those poverty programs, and then get to work on Social Security and Medicare and blame him. And he's such a fool he'll want to take credit for everything.
Me: And then what?
Him (laughing): They like Pence.
Me: What do you mean?
Him: Pence is their guy. They all think Trump is out of his mind.
Me: So what?
Him: So the moment Trump does something really dumb steps over the line violates the law in a big stupid clumsy way … and you know he will ...
Me: They impeach him?
Him: You bet. They pull the trigger.

[Paul Rigby]

Donald Trump speech at CIA memorial risks fueling intelligence feud

• In first official act, Trump pledges support for agency he has attacked
  
• Former director angered' by political speech at wall for dead officers
  

Spencer Ackerman in New York and Sabrina Siddiqui in Washington
Sunday 22 January 2017 02.03 GM

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017...st-meeting

FULL SPEECH: Donald Trump CIA Headquarters Statement

Published on Jan 21, 2017
President Donald Trump is telling CIA employees whose work he has publicly doubted that no one feels stronger about the intelligence community than he does. Trump is addressing about 400 CIA employees at their headquarters in Langley, Virginia, on his first full day in office. Trump told the workers that they are really special and amazing people and that "I am so behind you." The meeting follows Trump's repeated and sharp public criticism of U.S. intelligence agencies before and after the election. He challenged and at times belittled their conclusions that Russia attempted to influence the election to help him win the White House.

[video=youtube_share;GMBqDN7-QLg]http://youtu.be/GMBqDN7-QLg[/video]

Donald Trump may have thrown fuel on to his feud with the Central Intelligence Agency, through what he apparently intended as a peace offering.

Traveling to CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia in what the White House pointed out was Trump's first official act in office, Trump stood before the agency's memorial to its dead officers and delivered an often self-referential and highly political speech that included an untruthful claim that his inauguration was better attended than those of Barack Obama.

Trump vowed "a thousand percent" support for an intelligence corps he has repeatedly and publicly insulted including recently likening intelligence officials to "Nazi Germany" and suggested they would have an open checkbook in his White House. Any feud between himself and the agency was the result of a dishonest press corps, the president astonished some by saying.

The speech's tone, contrasting with the solemnity typically shown to the CIA memorial, prompted the just-retired director of the agency to proclaim his disgust.

Through a spokesman, John Brennan proclaimed himself "deeply saddened and angered at Trump's despicable display of self-aggrandizement".

The three-decade agency veteran added: "Trump should be ashamed of himself."

Trump's associates are under a counterintelligence investigation to determine the nature of their ties with Russia, an inquiry that includes the CIA. Brennan participated in an assessment that found Russia interfered in the 2016 election for Trump's benefit.

Beginning in December, Trump rejected the CIA assessment, claiming it was produced by "the same people that said Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction". In January, ahead of meeting with the outgoing intelligence leadership, he told the New York Times the focus on Russian intrusions in the election was a "political witch-hunt".

While he struck a conciliatory tone after that meeting, he wrongly accused the agency of leaking an incendiary and unverified dossier filled with rumored ties to Russia that multiple news organizations had long possessed. Trump went so far as to liken the agency to Nazi Germany, a statement that astonished intelligence veterans.

Brennan recently told the Wall Street Journal that Trump's comparison was "very repugnant" and crossed "the line".

Yet at Langley on Saturday, Trump said nothing at all about the Russia assessment, and insisted that the "dishonest" media had invented a dispute with the intelligence community that he persistently and publicly waged. The CIA crowd applauded Trump's derisive comments about the press.

"They made it sound like I had a feud with the intelligence agencies. It is exactly the opposite," Trump said, adding: "I love you, I respect you, there is nobody I respect more."

Trump suggested that "sometimes you haven't always gotten the backing" from the White House, suggesting Obama had "restrained" the agency, and said to laughter and applause: "You're going to say, Please don't give us so much backing.'"

The reference to "restraint" appeared to be a reference to Obama ending the CIA's post-9/11 torture program, something Trump has repeatedly endorsed restarting and about which his pick to run the CIA has sent mixed messages.

Mike Pompeo, whose nomination vote Democrats in the Senate delayed until Monday, had testified on 10 January that he would "absolutely not" return the CIA to torture, frequently pledging to follow laws that prohibit interrogation techniques not approved by the army's interrogations field manual.

But in written questions subsequently provided to the Senate intelligence committee on 18 January, Pompeo said he will in office "consult with experts at the Agency and at other organizations in the US government on whether the Army Field Manual uniform application is an impediment to gathering vital intelligence to protect the country or whether any rewrite of the Army Field Manual is needed".

Pompeo pledged to inform the committee of any changes to the law he would seek, and continued: "If experts believed current law was an impediment to gathering vital intelligence to protect the country, I would want to understand such impediments and whether any recommendations were appropriate for changing current law."

At Langley, Trump said Pompeo was a "total star, a total gem" and revealed that Pompeo was the only candidate he vetted for the CIA directorship, one of the most powerful positions in the US government. After meeting Pompeo, Trump said, he cancelled interviews with eight unnamed alternative candidates.

President Trump leaves CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia. Photograph: Carlos Barria/Reuters: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017...ting#img-1

Suggesting he would provide the CIA greater latitude than under Obama, Trump said it would be "one of the most important groups" in combatting Islamic State and what he called "radical Islamic terrorism".

Trump also reiterated a campaign utterance about stealing Iraq's oil and mused: "Maybe we'll have another chance."

He went on to discuss the crowds attending his events, said he felt "35 or 39" again, and boasted of being on more Time Magazine covers than the New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady.

Adam Schiff, the chief Democrat on the House intelligence committee, sounded incredulous over Trump's speech, particularly over the president's use of the agency memorial "as a backdrop".

"While standing in front of the stars representing CIA personnel who lost their lives in the service of their country hallowed ground Trump gave little more than a perfunctory acknowledgment of their service and sacrifice," Schiff said in a statement.

"Instead he argued at length about the size of the crowd at his inauguration, set out his favorites in the media, meandered through a variety of other topics unrelated to intelligence, and made the astounding claim so belied by the evidence I love honesty."

[Paul Rigby]

Trump at Langley, the CIA's Lion's Den

By Stephen Lendman
Global Research, January 22, 2017

http://www.globalresearch.ca/trump-at-la...en/5570195

On Saturday, Trump entered the lion's den, visiting and speaking at CIA headquarters.

The agency under departed director John Brennan wanted his scalp delegitimized and undermined, based on phony claims of Russian US election hacking, helping him defeat Hillary.

He's now America's 45th president. His incoming CIA director Mike Pompeo has yet to be confirmed. Senate Democrats Ron Wyden (OR), Patrick Leahy (VT) and Richard Blumenthal (CT) delayed his confirmation, solely for political reasons.

It was scheduled for Friday, Trump's inaugural day. A joint statement said "in these dangerous times, (his) nomination (must) be thoroughly vetted, questioned and debated."

With or without Pompeo in charge, the CIA constitutes a major threat to Trump, all other prominent figures challenging dirty business as usual and most important world peace.

The late Chalmers Johnson called the agency incompatible with democratic freedoms. Its "unchecked power" threatens everyone everywhere. Its existence "shorten(s) the life of the American republic."

At Langley, Trump spoke to around 400 CIA personnel, coming in on their day off to hear him. With Pompeo accompanying him, he criticized Senate Democrats for delaying his confirmation, saying they're "playing little political games."

Trump wants him heading the agency posing his greatest threat, saying he was the only one he interviewed for the job. "I didn't want to meet anybody else. I said cancel them, cancel them."

He told House Speaker Paul Ryan "I don't want to lose this guy." Does he believe Pompeo as his man heading the CIA can protect him from potential agency anti-Trump long knives?

Does he believe a peace offering by showing up as his "first (post-inaugural) stop," and saying he's "behind you 1000%…(N)obody…feels stronger about the intelligence community and CIA than Donald Trump" can save him if agency dark forces want him eliminated?

Last week, he blasted now departed CIA head John Brennan for being "the leaker of (anti-Trump) fake news"- referring the fabricated dodgy dossier, claiming Russia has compromising information about him, alleging it could be used for manipulative purposes.

No one is afforded a honeymoon with America's leading rogue agency without playing by its rules, established by America's deep state.

If Trump goes his own way, contrary to longstanding US practices, especially geopolitically, he'll be vulnerable to impeachment or assassination.

Peacemaking at Langley, with his man in charge once confirmed, won't help if he's targeted for removal.

His vulnerability, or lack of it, will be better known once his policies become clear. Unprecedented vilification throughout the political season and post-election aftermath isn't an encouraging sign.

The best advice he should heed is watch your back. Even that won't help if America's deep state wants him removed and replaced. Rough and tumble times ahead seem likely.

Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago. He can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net.

[Paul Rigby]

Trump and the Deep State - Global Research News Hour Episode 167

By Michael Welch, Prof Michel Chossudovsky, Mark Robinowitz, and Jack Rasmus
Global Research, January 22, 2017

http://www.globalresearch.ca/trump-and-t...te/5570159

"You have to go back to Nixon to find a president with as strong negative views about the agency. But the agency did not get this kind of public disparagement from Nixon." -

Paul Pillar, a former senior CIA official, in an interview with AlterNet. [1]

Donald Trump has finally taken his oath of office and assumed the role of President of the United States of America.

His inauguration on Friday, January 20th coincided with numerous protests both in Washington and in cities across the US and around the world.

Trump's rise to power and his cabinet picks have provoked numerous questions. Will he indeed build a wall between Mexico and the US? Will he register Muslims? What will become of the Free trade agreements like NAFTA which he has vowed to scrap or renegotiate? If he is mending relations withRussia, what will that mean for current hot-spots Syria and Ukraine, and for foreign policy generally?

On this week's Global Research News Hour we take a look behind the scenes to determine how political events such as the recent election, are being manipulated to achieve elite ends, and the consequences for US democracy, and perhaps the future of Humanity.

Dr. Jack Rasmus is a progressive journalist, radio host, former union organizer and local president, and author. Hs upcoming book, Central Bankers on the Ropes: Monetary Policy and the Next Depression' will be released in April.

Professor Michel Chossudovsky is an award-winning author, Professor of Economics (emeritus) at the University of Ottawa, Founder and Director of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG), Montreal, and Editor of Global Research.

Mark Robinowitz is a writer, political activist, ecological campaigner and permaculture practitioner and publisher of oilempire dot us, a political map to connect the dots. campaigner and permaculture practitioner for over three decades.

LISTEN TO THE SHOW: http://www.radio4all.net/files/scottpric...ixdown.mp3

[Magda Hassan]

I have been asked what I think about the protests and marches against the inauguration of Donald Trump, as well as what to say in response to liberals, leftists, women, feminists, trans* persons and others participating in them. This essay represents an answer to the question.
Let me explain: those asking are generally unsure of their position and balance in today's political landscape. While the ascension of Trump strikes many as quite ominous, those asking this are also very uncomfortable about the Trump opposition. That opposition seems coincidentally aligned with particular ruling interests and agencies, including the intelligence community, the political elite and their billionaire donors, and the corporatocracy that is, many of the essential structural components of US worldwide dominance and domestic rule.
The fact is despite the honest motives and real political objectives of participants the contemporary left-liberal movement, inclusive of the Women's March on Washington, is being promoted and supported, financially and otherwise, by particular sectors of the ruling class in particular the financial sectors inclusive of Wall Street and the banks, the dominant political sector, and the intelligence sector. These sectors are currently struggling to regain hegemony after a recent loss to the sectors that support Trump, which include the military and industrial bases. The prior sectors control most of the mainstream media and sponsored the candidacy of Hillary Clinton. Most of the mainstream media are promulgating dissent and agitation against the recent realignments. And the mainstream media operate under the authority and direction of the same corporate and political masters who backed Clinton.
If you don't believe that sectors of the ruling elite are supporting and promoting the current dissent, consider the following question: Why was the biggest protest in world history ignored by the media? As a CLG's Lori Price, a participant-observer in the February 2003 anti-war protest, noted:
Over a million people in Manhattan alone marched against George W. Bush's impending invasion and occupation of Iraq. In the course of the NYC march, which was virtually blacked-out in the media, I witnessed a gaggle of reporters descend on a small counter-protest, consisting of approximately 200 people, apparently in order to record and air their views.

Many millions in the US and throughout the world marched against the impending Iraqi war. Why did the media largely ignore these much larger and arguably much more focused marches, while fetishizing a tiny number of pro-war marchers? And more to the point, why did these same media virtually hover over the Women's March in Washington? Clearly, the major media corporations are opposed to Trump. And so are the corporate capitals whose interests those media serve.
Mark Crispin Miller, a long-time friend and colleague at NYU, was recently called a "misogynist" for comparing the New York Times coverage of the Women's March to the relative lack of coverage of the February 2003 anti-war march in their own city of New York. Although I expect a similar backlash for this essay, such a response would be mistaken. Contrary to the "logic" of identity politics that all statements can essentially be reduced to the identity of their speaker it is not misogynist to state a fact in this case, the fact that the Iraq war protests, while much larger than the Women's marches, were largely ignored by the mainstream media, while the Women's March enjoyed blanket coverage. Like nearly all SJW-based arguments, this is an ad hominem, and thus, invalid.
Occupy Wall Street activist and journalist Arun Gupta chastised others who have questioned the motives, politics, and class composition of the Women's March. Gupta wrote: "If you are not involved in social, political, or intellectual work directly related to building and strengthening organizing, and are still complaining about today, then you are a crank."
Lest I be numbered among such cranks, my response to Gupta is in part the following. (I won't deal with the obvious virtue-signaling and white-knighting of his callout): If you are involved in social, political and intellectual work that is propped up by the ruling-class sectors who sponsor the intentionally fractious, identity-politics-driven, Social-Justice-Warrior-inflected AstroTurfy anti-Trumpist movement that includes the Women's March on Washington and the like, then perhaps you are not a crank. But, be careful, lest you play the role of a dupe. This is not to erase the agency or intentionality of those involved in the protests and marches. But it is also not to ignore the blatant and undeniable fact of the socio-economic and political structures that can rightly be understood as producing and manipulating much of the Trump opposition, even while the opposition of the masses may have legitimacy in its own right. Contrary to the popular opinion on the Left, what we are witnessing and experiencing does not represent the re-emergence of a 1930s-like fascism opposed by some beleaguered and innocent liberalism. First as tragedy, then as farce.
As made evident in the DNC emails released by WikiLeaks, the notion of an innocent liberal order threatened by a belligerent, bigoted, misogynist, xenophobic, fascist and otherwise horrible emergent regime is based on disingenuous cherry-picking and utterly ignores the racism, bigotry and other foulness in their very midst. Jonathan Turley puts it as such:
What is striking to me is how many have forgotten what brought about this election. Hillary Clinton is now portrayed as a selfless feminist and progressive who was defeated by angry white men despite the fact that she did worse with women than the prior two elections and barely won the female vote. While Trump is (correctly) criticized for failing to turn over his tax records, it is forgotten that Clinton refused to turn over her Wall Street speeches. While Trump is (correctly) criticized for contradictions in the media, it is ignored that Clinton continually changed her account for such issues as her reckless use of a personal server or other accounts. That is why I was highly critical of both candidates.
Furthermore, figuring Trumpism and its opposition in such terms ignores the fact that the sides are not, as some would have it, working-class heroes versus ruling-class-supporting dopes but rather one ruling-class contingent and its mass supporters versus another ruling-class contingent and its mass supporters. The "innocent liberalism" represented by the organized Trump opposition is a thin scrim masking the voracious will to power of a ruling-class faction of finance capital, mass media, the political elite, and the corporatocracy. And these "innocent liberals" (I am writing now of the media mouthpieces and their masters in particular, but not exclusive of their supporters who echo their epithets) aim to tarnish another faction by calling them "fascists." They also aim to figure anyone who doesn't buy into their figuration of the political situation as misogynist, reactionary, or even alt-right.
But, contrary to this facile understanding, the turmoil, disorientation, and surreality of the contemporary political moment are some of the effects of a division and struggle within the ruling sectors. We are sensing the tremors of a heaven-quake, caused by an Olympian civil war within the ruling class. Likewise, the dissent within the US today is not entirely unlike that of the CIA-fomented Arab Spring, only taking place within our borders. The only question is just how far it will go.

http://www.legitgov.org/Inauguration-Tru...n-Trumpism

[David Guyatt]

But, contrary to this facile understanding, the turmoil, disorientation, and surreality of the contemporary political moment are some of the effects of a division and struggle within the ruling sectors. We are sensing the tremors of a heaven-quake, caused by an Olympian civil war within the ruling class. Likewise, the dissent within the US today is not entirely unlike that of the CIA-fomented Arab Spring, only taking place within our borders. The only question is just how far it will go.

http://www.legitgov.org/Inauguration-Tru...n-Trumpism

It's the only credible explanation.

The dissent, I think, goes considerably deeper and is of a different nature. That's my take-away anyway.

[Tracy Riddle]

Trump doesn't give a flying squirrel's ass about any of that stuff. He'll appoint his own CIA director, and then it will be TRUMP'S CIA, and then he'll think everything is fine and dandy.

That's what I wrote last week. Did you all see his speech to the CIA? He LOVES the Agency now. Who EVER thought he was having a feud with them? Must have been the darn media making stuff up again!

[Paul Rigby]

It's begun: America's Maidan rears its head

http://www.fort-russ.com/2017/01/its-beg...s-its.html

January 23, 2017 - Fort Russ -
Ruslan Ostashko, LiveJournal - translated by J. Arnoldski

When I put forth the thesis in the Russian info-sphere that the US is turning into a bigger Ukraine, at first many thought that this was a funny political joke. But what is happening in Washington and other American - and some European - cities these days shows that this is not a joke, but the harsh reality we are living in. If we attentively and impartially look at how skillfully Donald Trump's administration is being shaken, then it is easy to see that the same techniques are being used against him that were worked out on the squares in Kiev, Cairo, Hong Kong, and Moscow. If we delve further into the details, then we can say for certain that an American Maidan is being prepared not only with the same patterns as the bloody color revolutions in other countries, but with the same sponsors. Let's break this down.

A wave of protests against newly-elected President Donald Trump is engulfing American cities. The demonstrations are allegedly being held in support of women's rights, but mainstream American media and demonstrators themselves have clearly said that they've come out to protest against the new administration. According to various estimates, the number of protesters in this "women's action" in Washington totals somewhere at 200,000 people, but the organizers have said that they have a "million women march on Washington." Stop. "March of millions"…does this not remind you of something? This is the same brand-motto that the Russian liberals organize their marches under. And the similarities do not end there.

The role of the instigator of the revolting creative class at the rally was played by Madonna who, by the way, never fulfilled her promise to orally satisfy everyone who voted for Clinton. In Russia and Ukraine, the "protest ringleader" part was also played by rock stars: Shevcuk and Vakharchuk. Demonstrations in support of the American "march of millions" have taken place in many European cities, which is really reminiscent of the demonstrations in support of the Maidan and Bolotnaya. The first broken windows and beaten police have also already appeared, as have several dozen arrested whom the anti-Trump press have rushed to call political prisoners, peaceful protesters, and innocent children. As the American police have reported, baseball bats and sharpened wooden stakes brought out to the protests were confiscated from these "innocent children." Doesn't this also remind you of something? Literally every detail here - from the media defense of "innocent protesters" to baseball bats - are elements that we have seen on all three Maidans.

And now a few words about the most important aspect, the money. An ex-Wall Street Journal reporter conducted an investigation of those NGO's that have identified themselves as the organizers and "key partners" of the "march of millions." Among these NGO's were found 56 organizations officially receiving money from George Soros' agencies. This is public information. And now just imagine what's going on behind the scenes.

For now the new administration is holding up well. In fact, there were plans to disrupt the inauguration, but Trump's supporters organized an undercover operation to film the "activist workshops" on preparing massive riots in Washington and then leaked this information on the internet a few days before the inauguration. This could not but interest competent authorities. The plans of so-called "anti-fascists" involved blocking the capital's metro and creating traffic jams. In one of the footage samples of such a "workshop" for protesters, you can hear how the organizer says "a blow to the throat works."

As pro-Trump journalists have reported, this information leak and exposure of plans forced the Clintonite mercenaries to greatly reduce their riot plans. The protests then turned out to be rather lethargic. But it must be understood that next time everything could go differently.

Now it is clear that the organizers of the American Maidan are ready to literally besiege Trump and batter-ram his administration until it is completely destroyed. They are looking for the same trigger that can turn protests into something massive, a main accusation which could allow a maximum number of people to be drawn out onto the streets. For now they've tried to spin the take that Trump "hates women." This didn't work out so well. I am sure that there will be more attempts to organize protests of African Americans and Mexican immigrants and then attempts at uniting all of them together. The inevitable finale would be charging Trump with treason and working for the Kremlin, as was the case with how they brought down Yanukovych.

I won't argue: this is a good plan. But there is one "but." Trump is not Yanukovych and, in the case of emergency, he really could call all of his supporters to Washington. There would be more than enough of them glad to lend him their armed support in the case that some security forces suddenly refuse to obey orders to disperse the American Maidan. In this case, blood - lots of blood - would flood American streets and the consequences would be unpredictable. This is bad for the whole world, as a Maidan in a country with nuclear weapons is a threat to the whole planet.

The only chance of avoiding a "Maidanization" of the US is if Trump and his administration rapidly and accurately begin depriving the key organizers of the American color revolution of all of their financial resources. The coming months will show whether the new administration has enough strength and courage to take such a step.

[Paul Rigby]

Russia, Beware of Trump U-Turns

Finian Cunningham

19:37 22.01.2017

https://sputniknews.com/columnists/20170...mp-u-turn/

Russia has cautiously welcomed the US presidency of Donald Trump, but still Moscow is wisely keeping a wait-and-see position on whether it can work with the new White House occupant to improve international relations.

Trump's oft-stated desire to restore friendlier relations with Russia and his comment last week that he would trust Russian leader Vladimir Putin as much as he would Germany's Angela Merkel are all to be welcomed as apparent steps toward a more sane US policy.

However, there remain big questions about Trump's reliability in following through.

Trump's apparent aspirations for normalizing relations with Russia are certainly more promising than the aggressive, Russophobia that has been the staple of Washington's policy under his predecessors, Barack Obama and George W Bush. But can the former business mogul deliver?

There's more than a sneaking feeling that the billionaire property magnate turned politician says a lot of things which he subsequently flatly contradicts. It's not clear if this trait is due to willful deception, or less maliciously, due to a feckless, short attention span. Either way, the upshot is a character of questionable integrity.

Over the weekend, following Trump's inauguration as the 45th president of the United States, we got more of a flavor of his vacillating brand.

On Saturday, the first full day as president, Trump's first official duty was to visit the headquarters of the Central Intelligence Agency, at Langley, Virginia, just across the Potomac River from his White House residence in Washington DC.

There he lavished the agency with praise and gratitude, saying he was "1,000 per cent" in support of its intelligence work. Trump also scoffed at media reports that he was involved in a feud with the CIA. "No-one supports you as much as I do," said Trump to cheering agency staffers.

Now hold on a moment. Trump was indeed very publicly running a battle with the CIA and other US intelligence agencies before and after the election on November. He had initially denounced their claims that Russia had hacked the elections as "ridiculous". Later, he sort of retracted that, agreeing with their allegations against Russia.

Only weeks before his inauguration, Trump slammed the CIA for "Nazi" practices over leaks to media outlets that the agency had briefed him about allegations of Russian blackmail.

Some observers have noted approvingly that this abrasive attitude from Trump towards the CIA indicated a bold independence from the shadowy unelected power centers of the US the so-called Deep State.

But instead what we saw over the weekend was President Trump making it a priority to coddle the spooks who act as the muscle behind the Deep State. Just remember the phrase: "I'm a 1,000 per cent behind you." Rather different from John F Kennedy's vow to "splinter the CIA into a thousand pieces".

The CIA is one of the most criminal, murderous secret agencies ever in the history of the world which has been essential for the projection of American power. It is involved in everything from assassinating foreign leaders, to overthrowing democratic governments in place of murderous regimes, to covertly arming terrorist proxies.

For Trump to rush over to Langley as his first order of business on his first day in office and to exalt an agency known informally but more accurately as "Murder Inc", is a disturbing sign of where his priorities lie.

The following instances are not meant as a comprehensive list of other Trump U-turns, but there's enough contained here for serious doubts about his character.

Straight after his presidential swearing-in on Capitol Hill, Trump was hosted at a Congressional luncheon on Friday. In after-dinner toasts, he singled out Hillary Clinton and her husband, ex-president Bill, as "fine people" and requested they both stand up to receive applause from the hundreds of guests.

Say what? During the election campaign against Democrat rival Hillary Clinton, Trump had ferociously labelled her "Crooked Hillary" owing to Wall Street sleazy connections. Trump had also vowed to launch criminal investigations against Clinton and he encouraged his supporters at rallies to chant, "Lock her up! Lock her up!"

Another one of Trump's rallying calls was a promise to "drain the swamp" in Washington of big business interests, lobbyists and political place men. But so far he has stuffed his incoming cabinet with nominees who are billionaire personifications of the Washington swamp, appointing Wall Street financiers to positions overseeing government finance and the economy.

On a lighter note, but equally enlightening, was Trump's twitter rage at Hollywood actress Meryl Streep. After blasting Trump at the Golden Globes awards ceremony earlier this month, he hit back by describing the screen star as "over-rated". Though only a couple of years ago, Trump named Meryl Streep as one his favorite artists.

Getting back to a more serious vein, last week Donald Trump gave a wide-ranging interview to British and German media in which he pilloried Russia for its military intervention in Syria and blamed Moscow for unleashing a "humanitarian crisis".

That marked quite a change from Trump's earlier stated views on Russia's actions in Syria, when he praised them for wiping out Daesh (also known as ISIS/ISIL/IS) and other terror groups.

In his weekend fawning over the CIA, Trump was following on from the pathetic prostrations of his cabinet picks during Congressional confirmation hearings over the past two weeks. Nominee after nominee, including his pick for defense secretary General James "Mad Dog" Mattis, and his chosen new director for the CIA, Mike Pompeo, have cravenly adopted the establishment line that Russia represents a dire threat to US national security.

All this, and more besides, raises the question: can Trump be trusted?

When Trump says the US-led NATO military alliance is "obsolete", what does that really mean? That the 28-nation war machine should be decommissioned? Or rather, does "obsolete" in Trump's inscrutable thinking mean that the war machine needs to be revamped and reinvigorated?

There seems little doubt that the election of Trump was to be preferred over Hillary Clinton. Her open hostility towards Russia and willingness for military confrontation would have been disastrous.

By contrast, Trump's stated willingness to engage positively with Russia is a welcome departure from the belligerent policy extant in Washington.

Nevertheless, there are more than a few signs that Trump is just a maverick big-mouth who says things with gusto only to flatly contradict himself later.

Perhaps Trump does personally want to restore relations with Russia. Perhaps he will go ahead and meet Vladimir Putin in person soon.

So far, Moscow has cautiously welcomed Trump's presidency. But Russian leaders know that the systematic causes of US belligerence run much deeper than one man can possibly contest.

Moreover, given Trump's erratic thinking there are grounds for suspicion that the deeper system of US power the Deep State will be able to manipulate him into adopting its agenda. With regard to Russia and other perceived global rivals that agenda is one of hostility and conflict not partnership. That's how US capitalist power operates.

In which case, Russia is prudent to be wary of the Trump administration. Hope for the best, but expect a Trump U-turn at any time.