by William Skink

I don’t think Democrats can stop themselves from imploding over Russia-gate. It doesn’t matter that according to a recent Gallup poll, less than 1% percent think it’s the most important issue facing America. Despite the unenthusiastic perception of the general public, the obsessive focus by the resistance on RUSSIA, RUSSIA, RUSSIA continues to be a useful tool capable of multiple functions, like a political Swiss Army knife.

The first function was to shift attention away from the exposure of DNC corruption and HRC’s uniquely awful candidacy. A similar function has been to distract from the growing evidence of political bias within the FBI/DOJ. If you are not concerned that Strzok himself declared there’s no there there, then your hatred of Trump has impaired your ability to think objectively about the serious ramifications for what this admission means, especially after Lisa Page allegedly confirmed Strzok was indeed referring to the Russian investigation.

The gift of Russia-gate for Democrats also allowed spurious attacks on Jill Stein, tainting the despised Green Party in the process. Montana Democrats should appreciate that.

Also ignored thanks to Russia-gate is any serious focus on domestic voter purges, vulnerable voting machine software and gerrymandering. And let’s not forget that brazen smear of alternative media facilitated by the Bezos Post. Matt Taibbi did a great take down of the effort at the time for Rolling Stone.

Even local media upstart Missoula Current is getting in on the Russophobic bandwagon by running an absurdly hysterical op-ed recently by some former Marine by the name of Jon-Claud Nix. After stating (without evidence, as usual) that VLADAMIR PUTIN DID THIS (meddled in the US election), this former Marine says:

Americans of honest faith should no longer judge Trump based on the results of Mueller’s probe of election collusion; they must recognize that right now their president, the most powerful person in world governance, openly works for Russia’s interests and against America. (We’ll leave aside the completely baffling question of, “Why??”)

This is what collusion looks like in real time.

To many of us who care deeply for and even served our country against foreign enemies, Trump publicly siding with Putin is treasonous. Continuing to criticize allies while mimicking the talking points of an autocratic, lying, former KGB, Russian dictator are the words and deeds of someone who is a traitor to his country.

I find it quite interesting that this Jon-Claud dude is downplaying Mueller’s investigation. Could this be a result of a growing awareness that the bigger story is how Team Obama exploited opposition research to direct the vast powers of the surveillance state to spy on their political opponent? And still haven’t come up with convincing evidence of collusion?

No, that narrative can’t be acknowledged by the resistance. Instead we get condescending shit like this:

This doesn’t matter much as it pertains to Trump himself: True Believers in the Dear Leader will never see the truth, no matter how often or comprehensively it is pointed out. Montana Trump supporters are all-in, psychologically and politically. The Great Falls rally two weeks ago settled this point. They deserve a marginal amount of sympathy: it must be crushingly difficult to recognize that you were duped by a con-man and voted for someone who never cared about your interests.

What matters now is that Greg Gianforte and Steve Daines (the latter is not on the November ballot) either declare that they are for America and not Trump-and-Russia or get replaced.

This highlights anther use of Russia-gate: deploy against Republican politicians in a manner that calls into question their patriotism. McCarthy would be proud.

As an added bonus, Russia-gate could also help establishment Democrats fend off the progressive insurgency threatening to inch their center-right positions to the left.

For more on that front I suggest reading this MoA post, titled ‘Progressives Are Putin Stooges’ – How Centrist Democrats Help To Reelect Trump. I found this perspective from Doug Henwood (referenced in the post) to be worth highlighting:

It seems that Democrats are now incapable of talking about anything but Russian interference in our sacred elections.

The Trump administration is eviscerating environmental regulations, appointing horrific judges, prosecuting a grotesque war on refugees and immigrants, and we’re hearing about little other than Putin’s alleged hold over Trump, often expressed in grossly homophobic terms.

In doing so, they’re accepting uncritically the version of events proffered by cops, prosecutors and the CIA, organizations made up of professional liars who’ve been enemies of democracy and free expression at home and abroad for decades.

We’re seeing Dem pundits even accusing Bernie Sanders and other insurgents within their party of being Russian agents, witting or unwitting. Their indictments of Trump for treason make them sound like demented right-wingers at the height of the Cold War.

This obsession does relieve mainstream Democrats of concocting an attractive agenda that might win an election or two, but to do that they’d have to tack left, and Goldman Sachs wouldn’t like that.

This Russia obsession’s a win win for the establishment though – subdue Trump and the domestic left insurgency all at once.

I understand why those within a half a standard deviation of the center would embrace it, but why anyone further left would play along with it is beyond me.

Please stop.

Sorry Doug, they’re not going to stop. Why? Because Russia-gate is the gift that keeps on giving.

That is, until it doesn’t.