The Screws Tighten
A collusion skeptic wavers
WHEN it comes to Russian collusion, I’ve always been a skeptic. Here’s why.
Yes, President Trump’s first national-security adviser, Michael Flynn, took money from RT, the Russian propaganda channel, and had contacts with Moscow’s ambassador to Washington that he lied about. But connecting those dots to a conspiracy against the US and the 2016 election has always seemed a crazy stretch.
Same with Jeff Sessions having had three contacts with the same ambassador in 2016. It made no sense that Sessions would lie about those contacts in his confirmation hearing as attorney general, but he did, and in such a manner that made it necessary for him to recuse himself in all matters relating to Russia. That made Trump mad, and the whole business basically destroyed Sessions’ career — and for what?
I’m aware of the oddity of Trump’s consistent refusal to take a critical posture toward Vladimir Putin, both before the election and after. But I’m also aware of the fact that the Trump administration has authorized the sale of lethal defensive weapons to Ukraine, which was more than his predecessor was willing to do for Kiev’s pro-Western government.
Likewise, Carter Page and George Papadopoulos — the two Trump campaign officials we were told had been behaving in weird ways toward Russia during 2016 — were barely campaign officials at all. They were and are nobodies. They were unpaid. And they had no serious role in anything. They may or may not have wanted to collude, but they had no impact on the campaign in either case.
Finally, I know the Trump Tower meeting with a Kremlinfriendly Russian lawyer in June 2016 looks suspicious, especially since the president himself dictated an explanation about it a year later that was a lie, but the simple fact that everybody there said it was boring and that the lawyer was obsessed with sanctions Trump had no power to do anything about seems more plausible than that a giant conspiracy emanated from it.
Today, I’m not such a skeptic any longer. Here’s why.
For starters, we now know, from the plea deal between Trump lawyer Michael Cohen and special counsel Robert Mueller that the Trump organization was actively seeking business opportunities in Moscow even as Trump was securing the GOP nomination. Given the transactional nature of both Trump and Putin, the idea that quid pro quos might have been discussed is impossible to dismiss.
Second, we have, in the past few days, learned of the first possible connection between Russian intelligence and actions taken by the president. This is a little hard to unravel. There’s a radio guy named Randy Credico. There’s a conspiracy monger named Jerome Corsi. And there’s Trump political consigliere Roger Stone.
According to e-mails, back in 2016, Credico was supposedly in touch with WikiLeaks. Credico told Corsi WikiLeaks had a lot of stuff on Hillary. Corsi told Stone the stuff was coming — and that Trump should start talking about Hillary’s health. Which he did.
WikiLeaks did have lots of stuff on Hillary — or rather, on the Democratic National Committee. It received this material from Russian intelligence, which was doling it out under a false Internet identity called “Guccifer 2.0.”
So. It seems there was something in the DNC e-mails that suggested Hillary might have been unwell. Those e-mails came from Russian intelligence. WikiLeaks boss Julian Assange told Credico about the fact that the e-mails were going to be released and that Trump should talk about Hillary’s medical condition. And Trump did.
So: Russian intel gave dirt to Assange, who informed Credico, who in turn gave Corsi a heads-up, who told Stone. Who told Trump.
One last point: Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort, who received tens of millions from Ukrainian politicians aligned with Moscow. Manafort was tried and convicted on charges brought by Mueller, but none of them related to the campaign.
Mueller may not be done with him, and clearly Manafort isn’t done with Trump, either. So those who are as collusion-skeptical as I was might want to keep your powder dry.