[CTC] Trump’s Worst Collusion Isn’t With Russia — It’s With Corporations

[Manuel Perez Rocha]

Trump’s Worst Collusion Isn’t With Russia — It’s With Corporations
*otherwords.org*
/trumps-worst-collusion-isnt-with-russia-its-with-corporations/
<http://otherwords.org/trumps-worst-collusion-isnt-with-russia-its-with-corporations/>
By Peter CertoJuly 12, 2017
[image: peter-certo]

The billionaires who backed Trump are making out a lot better than Putin.

*Peter Certo is the editorial manager of the Institute for Policy Studies
and the editor of OtherWords.org. *

I’ve always been a little skeptical that there’d be a smoking gun about the
Trump campaign’s alleged collusion with Russia. The latest news about
Donald Trump, Jr., however, is tantalizingly close.

The short version of the story, revealed by emails
<https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/07/11/us/politics/donald-trump-jr-email-text.html>
 the *New York Times *obtained, is that the president’s eldest son was
offered “some official documents and information that would incriminate
Hillary” and “would be very useful to your father.”

More to the point, the younger Trump was *explicitly *told this was “part
of Russia and its government’s support for Mr. Trump.” Donald, Jr.’s reply?
“I love it.”

Trump Jr. didn’t just host that meeting at Trump Tower. He also brought
along campaign manager Paul Manafort and top Trump confidante (and
son-in-law) Jared Kushner.

We still don’t have evidence they coordinated with Russian efforts to
release Clinton campaign emails, spread “fake news,” or hack state voting
systems. But at the very least, the top members of Trump’s inner circle
turned up to get intelligence they *knew *was part of a foreign effort to
meddle in the election.

Truthout.org/ Flickr

Some in Washington are convinced they’ve heard enough already, with
Virginia senator (and failed VP candidate) Tim Kaine calling the meeting “
treason
<http://www.cnn.com/2017/07/11/politics/tim-kaine-donald-trump-jr/index.html>
.”

Perhaps. But it’s worth asking: Who’s done the real harm here? Some argue
it’s not the Russians after all.

“The effects of the crime are undetectable,” the legendary social critic Noam
Chomsky says
<https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/05/opinion/noam-chomsky-on-trump-and-the-state-of-the-union.html>of
the alleged Russian meddling, “unlike the massive effects of interference
by corporate power and private wealth.”

That’s worth dwelling on.

Many leading liberals *suspect*, now with a little more evidence, that
Trump worked with Russia to win his election. But we’ve long *known *that
huge corporations and wealthy individuals threw their weight behind the
billionaire.

That gambit’s paying off far more handsomely for them — and more
destructively for the rest of us — than any scheme by Putin.

The evidence is hiding in plain sight.

The top priority in Congress right now is to move a health bill that would
gut Medicaid and throw at least 22 million Americans off their insurance —
while loosening regulations on insurance companies and cutting taxes on the
wealthiest by over $346 billion
<http://www.latimes.com/business/hiltzik/la-fi-hiltzik-obamacare-repeal-20170504-story.html>
.

As few as 12 percent of Americans
<http://www.politico.com/story/2017/06/28/health-care-polls-republicans-240062>
support
that bill, but the allegiance of its supporters isn’t to voters — it’s
plainly to the wealthy donors who’d get those tax cuts.

Meanwhile, majorities of Americans
<https://www.vox.com/energy-and-environment/2017/6/13/15681498/trump-government-fossil-fuels>
 in *every single *congressional district support efforts to curb local
pollution, limit carbon emissions, and transition to wind and solar. And
majorities in *every single state *back the Paris climate agreement.

Yet even as scientists warn large parts of the planet could soon become
uninhabitable, the fossil fuel-backed Trump administration has put a
climate denier in charge of the EPA, pulled the U.S. out of Paris, and
signed legislation to let coal companies dump toxic ash in local waterways
<http://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/319938-trump-signs-bill-undoing-obama-coal-mining-rule>
.

Meanwhile, as the administration escalates the unpopular Afghan war once
again, Kushner invited billionaire military contractors
<https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/10/world/asia/trump-afghanistan-policy-erik-prince-stephen-feinberg.html>—
including Blackwater founder Erik Prince — to advise on policy there.

Elsewhere, JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon and other architects of the housing
crash are advising Trump on financial deregulation
<https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2017/02/trump-dodd-frank/515646/>,
while student debt profiteers set policy
<https://www.commondreams.org/news/2017/04/12/devos-just-put-interests-predatory-profiteers-over-student-loan-borrowers>
at
the Department of Education.

Chomsky complains that *this *sort of collusion is often “not considered a
crime but the normal workings of democracy.” While Trump has taken it to
new heights, it’s certainly a bipartisan problem.

If Trump’s people did work with Russia to undermine our vote, they should
absolutely be held accountable. But the politicians leading the charge
don’t have a snowball’s chance of redeeming our democracy unless they’re
willing to take on the corporate conspirators much closer to home.



Manuel Pérez-Rocha
Associate Fellow
Institute for Policy Studies
*More than 50 years of turning ideas into action! *
Cel. 240-838-6623
www.ips-dc.org
http://www.ips-dc.org/issues/trade/
Follow me on Twitter @ManuelPerezIPS
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