But Donald Trump’s association with Russia’s “forever” President Vladimir Putin, is concerning. He’s connected to Russia through various business interests, and there’s no sign that Donald Trump will abandon those business connections. People wonder what the relationship between a Trump administration and the head of a former Cold War enemy will look like. Over the weekend, Vladimir Putin made a chilling declaration of who Americans actually elected into office. And it’s far worse than electing Donald Trump.
Vladimir Putin’s Joke Is A Message To The United States
On Friday, during an awards ceremony for geography students in Moscow, Putin used his time on stage with a nine-year old boy to set up a joke. He asked the kid, “Where does Russia’s border end?” The child nervously responded, “Russia’s border ends at the Bering Strait, at the border with the USA.” The element of surprise is part of what makes the punchline to any joke funny. And for the Kremlin leaders in the audience, it was effective.
His punchline was his own response to his own question saying, “Russia’s border doesn’t end anywhere.” And while he did follow it up by saying that he was joking, the message was clear. It meant that by electing Donald Trump, there were no longer borders between the USA and Russia. To put this in context, the BBC’s report on the event also added another statement — one Putin made to Russia’s ambassadors three months after he annexed Crimea in 2014:
“I would like to make it clear to all: our country will continue to actively defend the rights of Russians, our compatriots abroad, using the entire range of available means – from political and economic to operations under international humanitarian law and the right of self-defense.”
Europe Declares War On Russia’s News Propaganda Machine
The European Parliament has warned that "hostile propaganda" by Russia against the EU is growing https://t.co/5q2lMfnshp pic.twitter.com/DZjJglVwL5
— Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (@RFERL) November 26, 2016
But Putin isn’t lobbying to defend Russians in the United States. It’s obvious that the rise of regional superpowers are competing against each other. They want the role of determining who decides global policy. And this means moving a superpower like the United States out of the way. As shown earlier, Vladimir Putin says Russia will use a entire range of available means. This means that aggressive propaganda is one of them. The Washington Post filed a report about two independent groups studying Russian propaganda. They say that it was behind the boost of fake news that made headlines.
Last week, the European Parliament decided to pass a motion to end the spread of Russian propaganda throughout Europe. This got an angry response from Putin saying that Europe’s parliament was suppressing Russia’s point of view. The European Union’s effort in this matter is appropriate after Brexit. As the rise of nationalist populism has threatened their existence. No doubt it was reinforced through Russian propaganda, which consistently attacks Western democracies.
The author of the report which created the motion said that Russian propaganda is also targeting the United States. The report refers to the fact that mainstream media and politicians in Europe have helped spread Russia’s propaganda. It’s also been the case in America, through news coverage and lawmaking. Even Sean Hannity was busted for covering fake news stories. Hannity is with Fox News — a network that already spreads their own propaganda without Putin’s help.
Donald Trump Is Putin’s Puppet Now
While Putin didn’t come out and take responsibility for disrupting Western democracies, he did acknowledge the spread the presence of Russian “opinion” through state media, all of which is critical of the West by the way. In 2014, during the Madian uprising, there was a drastic change in the media climate in the Ukraine, with Russia rapidly establishing its infrastructure of propaganda, which is similar to what happened this year in the United States. So this pattern, we’ve seen it all before. Before Donald Trump entered the political scene, the United States had a solid and impenetrable wall of defense against Russia through its government. America’s leadership took a defiant stand against a figure who gets more and more powerful in his own country.
He is a man who has rigged his own elections — never mind the election in the United States — to stay in power. Putin has been president of Russia for longer than a true democracy would allow and he will continue to hold power until the world accepts that Russia has no border. A final confirmation of this is with the obvious similarities between Trump and Putin, in that they can never admit to any wrong doing, as they never apologize and they both rely on the disruption of fake news in order for them to seize control of the masses. Now thanks to Donald Trump, Russia’s borders no longer end at the Bering Strait.
Featured Image by DonkeyHotey via Flickr/CC BY 2.0
