Will US Elites Give Détente With Russia a Chance? By Prof. Stephen F. Cohen

The Trump-Putin meeting in Japan is crucial for both leaders—and for the world.

Despite determined attempts in Washington to sabotage such a “summit,” as I reported previously, President Trump and Russian President Putin are still scheduled to meet at the G-20 gathering in Japan this week. Iran will be at the top of their agenda. The Trump administration seems determined to wage cold, possibly even hot, war against the Islamic Republic, while for Moscow, as emphasized by the Kremlin’s national security adviser, Nikolai Patrushev, on June 25, “Iran has been and will be an ally and partner of ours.”

Indeed, the importance of Iran (along with China) to Russia can hardly be overstated. Among other reasons, as the West’s military alliance encroaches ever more along Russia’s western borders, Iran is a large, vital non-NATO neighbor. Still more, Teheran has done nothing to incite Russia’s own millions of Muslim citizens against Moscow. Well before Trump, powerful forces in Washington have long sought to project Iran as America’s primary enemy in the Middle East, but for Moscow it is a necessary “ally and partner.”

In normal political circumstances, Trump and Putin could probably diminish any potential US-Russian conflict over Iran—and the one still brewing in Syria as well. But both leaders come to the summit with related political problems at home. For Trump, they are the unproven but persistent allegations of “Russiagate.” For Putin, they are economic.

As I have also previously explained, while there was fairly traditional “meddling,” there was no “Russian attack” on the 2016 American presidential election. But for many mainstream American commentators, including the editorial page editor of The Washington Post, it is an “obvious truth” and likely to happen again in 2020, adding ominously that Trump is still “cozying up to the chief perpetrator, Russian President Vladimir Putin.” A New York Times columnist goes further, insisting that Russia “helped to throw the election” to Trump. Again, there is no evidence whatsoever for these allegations. Also consider the ongoing assault on Attorney General William Barr, whose current investigation into the origins of “Russiagate” threatens to conclude that the scandal originated not with Russia but with US intelligence agencies under President Obama, in particular with the CIA under John Brennan.

We should therefore not be surprised, despite possible positive national security results of the Trump-Putin summit in Japan, if the US president is again widely accused of “treason,” as he so shamefully was following his meeting with Putin in Helsinki in July 2018, and as I protested at that time. Even the Times’ once-dignified columnist pages thundered, “Trump, Treasonous Traitor” and “Putin’s Lackey,” while senior US senators, Democrat and Republican alike, did much the same.
Putin’s domestic problem, on the other hand, is economic and social. Russia’s annual growth rate is barely 2 percent, real wages are declining, popular protests against officialdom’s historically endemic corruption are on the rise, and Putin’s approval rating, while still high, is declining. A public dispute between two of Putin’s advisers has broken out over what to do. On the one side is Alexei Kudrin, the leading monetarist who has long warned against using billions of dollars in Russia’s “rainy day” funds to spur investment and economic growth. On the other is Sergei Glaziev, a kind of Keynesian, FDR New Dealer who has no less persistently urged investing these funds in new domestic infrastructure that would, he argues, result in rapid economic growth.

During his nearly 20 years as Kremlin leader, Putin has generally sided with the “rainy day” monetarists. But on June 20, during his annual television call-in event, he suddenly, and elliptically, remarked that even Kudrin “has been drifting towards” Glaziev. Not surprisingly, many Russian commentators think this means that Putin himself is now “leaning toward Glaziev.” If so, it is another reason why Putin has no interest in waging cold war with the United States—why he wants instead, indeed even needs, a historic, long-term détente.

It seems unlikely that President Trump or any of the advisers currently around him understand this important struggle—and it is a struggle—unfolding in the Russian policy elite. But if Trump wants a major détente (or “cooperation,” as he has termed it) with Russia, anyone who cares about international security and about the well-being of the Russian people should support him in this pursuit. Especially at this moment, when we are told by the director of the United Nations Institute for Disarmament Research that “the risks of the use of nuclear weapons…are higher now than at any time since World War Two.”

This commentary is based on Stephen F. Cohen’s most recent weekly discussion with the host of The John Batchelor Show. Now in their sixth year, previous installments are at TheNation.com.

Stephen F. Cohen is a professor emeritus of Russian studies and politics at New York University and Princeton University. A Nation contributing editor, his new book War With Russia? From Putin & Ukraine to Trump & Russiagate is available in paperback and in an ebook edition.

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Putin says liberalism is finished

By Jon Hellevig

Putin tells liberalism is finished.

In an interview with the Financial Times, Putin told that “the liberal idea” had “outlived its purpose” and said that nationalism is growing instead as the public has turned against immigration, open borders and multiculturalism.

“This liberal idea presupposes that nothing needs to be done. That migrants can kill, plunder and rape with impunity because their rights as migrants have to be protected,” the president succinctly put it.

Putin chastised the European liberal governments for not having acted to reassure the citizens. Instead those governments had pursued a mindless multiculturalism embracing, among other things, [false] sexual diversity.

On a positive note the president told that the liberals cannot anymore “simply dictate anything to anyone just like they have been attempting to do over the recent decades.”

Source: https://www.ft.com/content/670039ec-98f3-11e9-9573-ee5cbb98ed36

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Kazakhstan ends bank bailouts, writes off people's debts instead

Jon Hellevig: "Instead of bailing out banks and oligarchs, Kazakhstan will write off loans of the poor. This has been announced by new Kazakh president Kassym-Jomart Tokayev. There’s an unexpected corner of the world from where sound and fair financial policies emanate!

Doing this President Tokayev is actually reviving an ancient traditions of cancelling debts when a new ruler took over going back to Hammurabi, the Sumerians and other Near Eastern rulers. Michael Hudson has written a book called “And Forgive their Debts” depicting this story from Babylonia and to other Bronze Age Near Eastern realms.

Hudson tells that this concept of starting from a clean slate was also at the center of the Old and New Testaments, in the form of the Jubilee Year. Jesus actually said: “Forgive them their debts,” but it was converted by the Church to mean something vague in the form of: “Forgive them their sins.” Actually meaning, just pay up, and we’ll deal with the debts at the final judgement once you kick the bucket.

Forgiving of debts was also in ancient Greece and Rome an important policy goal in the fight against the oligarchs. Should become again."

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Nariman Gizitdinov and Tony Halpin • Bloomberg

Kazakhstan President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev said the debt relief would cost less than $1bn [Pavel Golovkin/Pool/Reuters]

Kazakh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev said he'll write off bad loans held by a sixth of the central Asian country's population, while signaling a sharp change in policy to end costly state bailouts of private banks.

The loan-forgiveness program is Tokayev's first major policy announcement since he was elected president on June 9 in a choreographed transfer of power that began when longtime leader Nursultan Nazarbayev stepped down as head of state in March. His victory was met with rare and widespread protests.

Bank bailouts are also a sensitive issue in Kazakhstan, which has been mired in a decade-long crisis in which the government has pumped at least $18 billion into lenders to keep the sector from collapsing under the weight of bad debts. The central bank is conducting a review of asset quality, prompting speculation that a new round of bailouts may be in the works.

"My attitude is that there should be no governmental bailouts" for lenders, Tokayev, 66, said in an interview Tuesday in the capital, Nur-Sultan. "My assessment of this issue as a president is that the government should not get involved any more, any longer, with its loans as far as private banks are concerned."

Debt relief

While the debt-relief initiative may help lenders, the total cost is likely to come in at "a bit less than $1 billion," according to Tokayev. More than 3 million Kazakhs in the energy-rich country of 18 million will get help to escape debts averaging 300,000 tenge ($790), he said. It is aimed at "people who find themselves in very difficult living circumstances," he said.

About 4,000 people were detained by police during a rare outburst of protests against what activists said was a lack of real choice in the recent vote, which Tokayev won easily with 71% support. Leader-for-life Nazarbayev, 78, handed the presidency to Tokayev in March, who called the early election "to remove any uncertainty." International observers criticized the conduct of the vote.
The new president's debt forgiveness program is similar to a controversial policy unveiled by Georgia's ruling party, which announced the write-off of loans for 600,000 people days before a hotly-contested presidential election won by its candidate in November. "We are not following the example of Georgia, this is a different case" focused on the poorest citizens, Tokayev said.

Nazarbayev berated ministers as "cowards" in January for failing to clean up the banking system, shortly before he dismissed the government and replaced the central bank governor. Yet the biggest bank rescues have involved people close to the former president's inner circle.

While Tokayev denied that political connections played a role in past bailouts, "the lesson has been accepted by us," he said. "We will take lessons from the past, from what has happened in the banking system, and I think that in a couple of years you'll have absolutely new questions."

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Domestic enemies want to suck Trump into his Vietnam: Iranian war

By Prof. Vladimir Golstein

Call me a cynic, but here is my cynical thought of a day.

So about forty years ago, the Democrats and their intellectual leader, Brzezinski, wanted to get rid of the hated regime. What do they do? They are utilizing the maniacs from Saudi Arabia, like Bin Laden, and their CIA enablers, to suck Brezhnev into the war in Afghanistan.

When Russians crossed the border, triumphant Brzezinski informed Carter that he'd created a perfect trap: Russian Vietnam, that would put an end to the Soviet Empire. 

Related: Trump Crosses Neocons, Says No War With Iran

Who hates Trump with the passion that equals Brzezinski's hatred of Russia? Democrats.

So they are egging or silently condoning the maniacs abroad (Saudis, Israelis) and the maniacs at home (Bolton, Pompeo) -- to suck Trump into his Vietnam: Iranian war. That would surely be the end of his presidency.

Related: “There Is Nothing Normal About John Bolton”: Tucker Carlson Tears Into Warmongering Neocons (Video)

It appears that Trump --probably encouraged by Tucker Carlson (too bad Brezhnev and his regime never had such smart conservatives on their side) has avoided this trap.

But the bottom line, the cynical and intelligent Democrats, would go to bed with a devil, just to get into WH. And damn the consequences.

Source: https://www.facebook.com/vladimir.golstein/posts/10214200051571015

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My Musings on Georgia's Anti-Russian antics by Prof. Vladimir Golstein

My Musings on Georgia's Anti-Russian antics by Prof. Vladimir Golstein

We know that politicians play their games and use their strategies, smokescreens, and spinning to get what they want. If Russophobia pays, why not use it? That's what they do in Poland, and Ukraine, and United Kingdom, and Baltic States. If it works for local consumption only, fine.

Russian government probably uses it too -- what's the best way to unite the nation than to show that it is under siege. So I am not surprised that Russian press milks the images of angry Georgians for their own purposes. 

But both sides, while pursuing their myopic political goals are playing with the national feelings of Russians, something that I find unacceptable.

With the sloppy way perestroika was accomplished, Russians felt utterly humiliated. Just few facts for those who have neither memory, nor understanding.

1991, and then again in 1998 --The collapse of the ruble, which twice wiped out all people's savings. People with say, comfortable 10 thousand rubles on their accounts (which was a price of a good car) ended up with $20 bill for that. Then New Chechen war and its losses.

1998. 80% of Russian farms went bankrupt. 70 thousand factories closed. Epidemic of unemployment. 72 mil Russians (half of the country) fell below the poverty line.

In 2006 Russian government estimated that that there were 715 thousand homeless kids, while UNISEF raised this number to 3 mil. Suicide rate doubled, violent crime rate increased fourfold, and consumption of alcohol doubled in comparison with the Soviet period.

1999. NATO bombs the hell out of Serbia, and all Russians can do is to watch it in helpless anger, Eltsin's excursion into Pristina notwithstanding.

Add to that a total change in ethnic make up of Russian cities, where all of the sudden all the markets belong to Azeris, plenty of other businesses are run by Chechens and Georgians, and so on. Yet, Russians just stoically put up with that, like a chained bear, continue to swallow the baiting, that comes both from these ethnic minorities inside the country, and outside it.

People who die at sixty with zero money to their name have to hear that they are occupants, that they are slaves, pigs, soviet deplorables, and all other crap that the westernized liberals along with assorted nationalists from Ukraine, Georgia or Estonia, keep on throwing at them.

Related: CIA instructs its puppet regime in Georgia to makes provocations against Russia

What should be truly surprising is that there are so few ethnic and other sorts riots. Any other powerful group, would be rioting non stop. Luckily, the economics has improved since then, and plenty of Russians can feel justifiable proud of what their country has accomplished. Yet, the sense of national insult, national humiliation has remained. At least among the people who've survived these awful years.

So if Georgians or any other fool wants to play with fire, let them. But I don't recommend it. Pushkin had warned the authorities of a Russian revolt: senseless and merciless, long time ago.

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Russia has evidence that US drone downed by Iran did violate Iran’s airspace

US President Donald Trump has signed an executive order imposing new "strong sanctions" against Iran in response to Tehran's downing of an American drone last week.

Trump said the latest sanctions would target Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Trump told reporters at the White House on Monday that Khamenei and his associates would be denied access to financial resources by the new sanctions.

READ MORE: https://on.rt.com/9wxb

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CIA instructs its puppet regime in Georgia to makes provocations against Russia

By Jon Hellevig

The CIA has called on its puppet regime in Georgia to make a serious provocation against Russia, with staged demonstrations and threats against Russians. An American woman who serves as the US puppet president of that country declared that "Russians are our enemies and occupiers." Protesters held up signs telling Russians to **ck off.

Then Putin told Russians would do just that, **ck off. There came a Russian law, that no flights between Russia and Georgia are allowed, meaning no tourists will travel. 

The rub here is that Russians are by far the biggest paying tourist group. They are the biggest group, but also the most affluent group. Armenians and Azeris from neighboring countries also cross the borders, but they hardly keep the economy going.

But the Russians do. 30% of the Georgian economy comes from tourism. And about at least one-fifth or some 6-7 percentage points of that stems from the aggressors (Russians). Russia is also the only country that buys their wine and mineral water. That could be another 2-3%. So, this CIA inspired provocation will cost about 10% of the already miniscule GDP of that country.

Georgia's GDP is about 16 billion USD nominally, and 40 billion on PPP. Tourism is 3 billion out of that (9 billion on PPP). So, quite a costly provocation. Good luck with that.

Georgia has been hostile to Russia aleady for 10 years. Now with the spark of this new round of hostility they say that they will get tourists from other countries if Russians won't come. But then why did they don't get any other tourists during the last 10 years of hostilities?

Did they even get a Trump tower?

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Iran’s air defenses shooting down US drone

Video footage of #Iran’s air defenses shooting down a high-altitude #US Navy surveillance #drone has been posted on social media by the Iranian military. It shows the missile launch and an explosion at the moment of interception. READ MORE: https://on.rt.com/9wqt

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