Preface: The following was posted on August 6....only hours after a Trump/Putin meeting was hinted at. Today Trump's press secretary said that the two would meet "one-on-one"....but that could be interpreted two ways....as it could mean one head of state to another....without a third....Zelensky....or it could be a sly way of saying that Trump and Putin would actually be alone....without anyone from their team. The Democrats should be shouting right now that Trump is not to meet with Putin without anyone else present....but they are not. You cannot have Putin meet alone with someone who was once prime kompromat materiel! This post will be up front for only a short while. It is still six posts below this.
Update....Thursday, August 14: Russia also said today that Putin will meet with Trump...."one-on-one"....before they meet with their delegations....but we still do not know if at least one of Trump's team will be present. To me this is unfathomable that members of congress are not speaking up and demanding that Trump is not allowed to sit down with Putin with no one else present!
After the meeting update: Well Trump did it again. He slid into the Beast....and Putin slid into the Beast next to him....and they talked in secrecy without any aides present. There probably was no stopping this because Trump does what he wants to do....but both the Democrats and Republicans could have made a stink before hand....so that at least Americans would know that once again that these two men with similar worldviews plotted on their own....and the world will never know what they said.
No Meeting Without Someone From His Team Present!
Trump said that there is a good chance that he and Putin might meet....even in as soon a week. A couple of things about this.....Trump and Putin met in July of 2018 in Helsinki. During that summit....Trump and Putin famously met for two hours with only an interpreter present....which dumbfounded Trump's team. What did they say? We don't know....and the democrats gave up a few years ago in trying to get the notes of the interpreter.
There are FBI and CIA officials who today have criminal investigations of them....by Trump's people....because they were very concerned....and may have acted like they were very concerned....that a prime Russian kompromat candidate in Donald Trump might actually become the President of the United States!
So if there is a week until a possible meeting between Trump and Putin might take place....then there should be plenty of time for someone of influence to lay the ground rules before the meeting.....no private meetings between Trump and Putin. Of course Trump doesn't lower himself to such ground rules.....but someone has to try.
Also.....we do not know much about the recent meeting between Steve Witkoff and Putin....but one sentence released drew my attention in that one of the things talked about was...."the prospect of possible development of strategic development" between the two countries. It is estimated that there have been one million casualties in the Russian military with possibly as many as 250,000 killed....and a half million casualties from the Ukraine with as many as 80,000 soldiers killed. The estimates of civilian casualties in the Ukraine are over 46,000 with over 23,000 killed.
We now know who Putin is. The words...."strategic development" between two countries....and hence leaders of two countries....seems to me to be too plebeian....too normal....too positive....to use when one of the leaders is a madman war criminal....but with Trump's history of complimentary statements about tyrants....it does seem quite natural.
