Did Russia interfere in the U.S. election in 2016? I don’t have inside information on that question.
If they did, one could understand why they might be tempted. After all, Hillary Clinton was clearly a mindless warmonger who never had an independent thought of her own in her entire lifetime. She could have been counted on to consider Russia an enemy. Donald Trump, on the other hand, at times sounded as if he understood that Russia was in no sense a natural enemy of the U.S., and possibly even a natural ally. Anybody in Russia who preferred Mrs. Clinton to Mr. Trump, would have been several bricks shy of a full load. So maybe Russia did fall to temptation, and try to influence the U.S. election in the favor of Donald Trump.
How dare they do such a thing? (That is, if they really did do such a thing.)
Well, maybe Russia took lessons not only from the history of the old Soviet Union, but also from the current United States of America–a country constantly involved in the political affairs of other countries for many decades.
Safe for Democracy: The Secret Wars of the CIA, by John Prados (2006), goes into considerable detail about many of the times the U.S. has butted its nose into the political affairs of other countries. Mr. Prados is not some wild-eyed radical. He seems to be a mainstream historian who has done his research, and is trying to tell the truth. The truth is not pretty.
He said in his foreword that many people around the world, according to polls, consider the U.S. to be “the greatest threat to world peace on the globe.” (p. xiii) Part of the reason for those fears is because of “the secret operations of the Central Intelligence Agency.” (p. xiii) However, it is clear that the CIA is not really a ‘”rogue elephant,”‘ but rather acting under orders from presidents. (p. xiv)
Here are some of the tools of the CIA: “political action, in which the objective is to influence opinion-makers or the politics of nations; psychological warfare and propaganda, which are tactical tools in many actions; support for military operations, an intermediate category between traditional covert action and military special operations–which consumes an increasing fraction of CIA effort; and paramilitary operations, which are covertly coercive.” (pp. xiv-xv)
“American undercover actions have resulted in upheavals and untold suffering in many nations while contributing little to Washington’s quest for democracy.” (p. xv) “Covert actions have been a negative factor in the American pursuit of democracy throughout the world.” (p. xv)
Didja ever wonder why Iran has seemed to have a thorough dislike of the U.S.? Remember the hostage taking of more than three decades ago? Well, there were reasons. The U.S. spent 10 to 20 million dollars helping organize a coup against the government of Dr. Mohammad Mossadegh, in the early 1950s. The political upheaval at the time led to several hundred people dying in street violence. But Mossadegh was successfully gotten rid of. “The United States, by participating in the coup, broke with its own tradition–and its declaratory policy–of unconditional support for democracy around the globe.” (p. 107) These facts are not esoteric information known only to a few. Entire books have been written which detailed the U.S. intervention. See, for example, Wilbur Crane Eveland’s 1980 book Ropes of Sand: America’s Failure in the Middle East, which details much more than the messing about in Iran.
Mr. Prados covers countless more U.S. interventions in the business of other countries. This is a long book of 696 pages. If you read it, you will have a much more difficult time of persuading yourself that the U.S. is always automatically on the side of the angels–if you still have such a notion. The book is long, but repays study, and of course opens up countless avenues for further research.
Does Main Sleaze Media know that the U.S. is the world leader in involving itself in the politics of other nations? Of course. The leaders, at least, could not be so ignorant and stupid as not to know. Why then the hypocritical whining about Russia’s possible intervention in our election? I think there may be at least two factors. 1/We in the U.S.–liberals, conservatives, Christians, neoconservatives (a brand of liberal), and most people in general–just think our blank doesn’t stink. We really are among the most arrogant people in world history. We assume that whatever we do is generous and wise. Our lack of objectivity about ourselves would be laughable, did it not issue forth in such tragic results for the rest of the world and for us. 2/Main Sleaze Media is counting on Joe Sixpack to be completely ignorant of U.S. interventions. How many people know what John Prados knows, and has tried to communicate to the rest of us? Only a handful of people. So Main Sleaze Media is counting on us to be ignorant. They want to manipulate us rather than tell us the truth. They want to pretend that Russian intervention in our election (again, if it really did happen), is some kind of horrific world record of monstrous behavior. They want to manipulate us because they want to do whatever they can to get rid of Donald Trump, or at least to hamper his presidency if they can’t succeed in getting rid of him. The left deals in manipulation. Here is a possible third reason: 3?/Instinct. Main Sleaze senses that the natives are restless. We proles, a growing number of us, have begun belatedly to sense that the “elites” running our country are scumbags. We might do something about it. Main Sleaze is part of the elite. They have to keep us barefoot and pregnant, and ignorant, else we might insist on taking the country back from them. Number 3 is kind of an extension of number 2, and also may be over the top speculation, too optimistic. But at some level the elite knows we are the enemy, and we are beginning to understand that they are the enemy. They want to keep control as long as they can. Understandably.
A Christian foreign policy would leave other people alone. What would be the fun in that?
Safe for Democracy: The Secret Wars of the CIA, by John Prados, is readily available on the Internet. Abebooks, a wonderful place to get books, and often much cheaper than Amazon, currently has used copies for sale for $4.21 or slightly more, with zero shipping charge.