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John McCain needs to calm down, take some Metamucil, and take a nap. I realize he doesn’t like President Trump a whole lot, and he likes Russia’s Vladimir Putin even less, but one would have thought that after decades of government service, the Senator would have learned at least something about protocol. That is apparently not the case.
President Trump called today to congratulate Vladimir Putin on his election victory, after the latter won 76.6 percent of the vote, and John McCain left some moist skidmarks in his Depends because of it.
An American president does not lead the Free World by congratulating dictators on winning sham elections. And by doing so with Vladimir Putin, President Trump insulted every Russian citizen who was denied the right to vote in a free and fair election to determine their country’s future, including the countless Russian patriots who have risked so much to protest and resist Putin’s regime.
Well, the cranky, mentally constipated Maverick is pretty damn wrong on that one. Barack Obama called to congratulate Vladimir Putin on his last victory in 2012, and Putin reciprocated.
George W. Bush called to congratulate Dmitry Medvedev when the latter won the presidency in 2008, gaining more than 70 percent of the vote.
It’s called protocol.
This is what the leaders of sovereign nations do when their counterparts win elections: they make the courtesy call, regardless of whether they get along or even like one another.
There’s no doubt in my mind that fraud (or “election irregularities” in polite PC speak) was a part of the election, as it was the last time Putin ran for president of Russia, per OSCE observers, Putin does remain unfailingly popular in Russia, despite the economic downturn and western sanctions after Putin’s antics in Ukraine and Crimea, and chances are he would have won anyway, given the competition.
The nearest opponent, Communist Party candidate Pavel Grudinin earned just 12.7 percent of the vote. I don’t know about anyone else, but unless one follows Russia closely, Grudinin – a businessman who was criticized by Russia’s commies for being “too bourgeois” – was pretty much unknown.
The candidate who enjoys the most fame – or infamy, in this case, because of his very public, drunken, batshit antics – was Vladimir Zhirinovsky, the loud, racist, ultranationalist nutjob whose claim to fame is threatening anyone who dares to voice an opposing opinion.
Ksenia Sobchak is the other candidate who is probably more well known in Russia than Grudinin. She’s a TV anchor and the daughter of two politicians – one of whom was the first “democratically” elected mayor of Saint Petersburg and Putin bud, the late Anatoly Sobchak.
In other words, Putin had very little competition. My educated guess is that the continued fraud was to ensure a large margin between Putin and his closest competitor to quell any doubts that Putin is still da man in Russia!
To be sure, Putin is a tyrannical jerk. Under his leadership, Russia is more repressive and corrupt than it has ever been since the fall of communism. Opposition politicians are either assassinated or imprisoned (see: Boris Nemtsov, Mikhail Khodorkovsky, and Alexei Navalny, for starters). Freedom of expression is pretty much nonexistent, ultranationalist voices and terminology have experienced a resurgence.
And while there’s no evidence that the Russians helped Trump win in any way, they certainly meddled in our elections, and even penetrated the election systems of more than 20 US states. Let’s not kid ourselves. Putin is a bad actor any way you slice it.
That said, protocol is protocol, and Trump did the right thing by calling and congratulating Putin on his victory.
McCain needs a blanky and some warm milk.
In other words, Putin had very little competition.
Well, actually, he had LOTS of competition. And it splits the vote very handily. What he didn’t have was *good* competition. (Which is why it only had to split ~25% of the vote.)
That dude on the far left. WTF is that on his head? Did something crawl up there and die?
I don’t actually think it’s a good idea to continue the protocol. But I would argue against the protocol, not against a President following it.
Alas, McCain is being McCain. He’s been an idiot for a long time. He wasn’t much of an officer or pilot. His daddy saved him form washing flight school, when anyone without the fatherly influence he has would have been washed, particularly when he drove an A-1 into the drink in Corpus Christi Bay.
By the by, Crimea is part of Ukraine. Referring to it in the manner you did comes down on Putin’s side as if it is a separate territory. It isn’t.
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