If your brain can handle more background on the perpetrator of multiple business failures who occasionally spends time in the Oval Office, Foreign Policy magazine – not known as a left-wing propaganda organ – has published a well-researched and dispassionate overview of business dealings with Russia.
A couple fun quotes:
“I think part of it was he was toxic to the banks. I think he also probably learned that personal guarantees [on loans] weren’t a brilliant idea either. So he was saying to himself, ‘What else could I do in the world? I’ll just convince people to buy my brand.’ And the only people who were willing to buy it were tasteless Russians, people who like the absurd, ostentatious gold-leaf lifestyle he has.”
– former business associate
“Trump is not much different than most of the NY real estate developers. Obnoxious, liar, screws people, impossible to trust, etc, but in NY real estate–not unusual. None of any of that is proof of anything other than Trump was considered a bad guy who nobody trusted to do business with in the US banking world. That is far from any proof he did anything wrong as to collusion which there was none.”
-Joel Ross, investment banker
Bonus Reading: a couple deep dives from The New Yorker – well-known for its fact checking:
“The President helped build a hotel in Azerbaijan that appears to be a corrupt operation engineered by oligarchs tied to Iran’s Revolutionary Guard.”
Trump, Putin and the New Cold War
“What lay behind Russia’s interference in the 2016 election—and what lies ahead?”
Happy New Year!
Grandpa Drumpf’s Alaskan whorehouse money sure bankrolled a dynasty of thimbleriggers.