aNewDomain — Russian president Vladimir Putin, as the United Nations has noted, is doing his best to install his stooge Donald Trump in the White House.
But if Trump loses, and it looks like he will, Putin could fairly easily do the next best thing: Destabilize the US and its interests by refusing to recognize the new
US President Hillary Clinton — and choosing to install Trump as US President in Exile instead.
After all, millions of Trump’s supporters already are falling for his prediction that, if he doesn’t win, it’s because the election had been rigged. Violence will likely result.
Trump doesn’t want to be seen as a loser.
So he will have no trouble accepting a different and, in a way, far more glamorous kind of win: US President in Exile, a title he will get courtesy of Russia and Putin.
Sound crazy? It isn’t, not really.
Consider. Putin is already hosting former Ukrainian president (and former Trump campaign chair Paul Manafort’s pal) Viktor Yanukovych, who claims to be the rightful president of the Ukraine, despite a revolution that forced him into exile.
Putting Trump in as US President in Exile would appeal strongly to Trump’s abundant sense of self.
It also happens to be the single most powerful way for Putin to create enormous instability here in the US, chiefly because Trump’s supporters will absolutely love it.
With their fearless leader still a winner — but in exile — renegade bands of US-bound Trump supporters will end up harrying the FBI for years. Our democracy will be continually shaken by random shootings, bizarre streams of online disinformation and all manner of right-wing Oklahoma City style bombings.
The project won’t be completely without challenges.
To Putin, Trump will seem to be a much bigger fish than Yanukovych, and for sure he would command better treatment.
Then again, Trump is gullible, narcissistic, and greedy, a combination Putin will find easy to manipulate and control.
Gathering a team in exile for Trump would be the big order of the day.
A US Supreme Court in Exile will be necessary. Who better to hold the title of Chief Justice of the Supreme Court in Exile than Rudy Giuliani?
It’s not like he has much else to occupy him after the election.
But in this role, Giuliani would play a critical role. He’s be the one to administer the oath of office to Trump under some provision of the US Constitution, a provision that presumably would be written later.
In the “emergency circumstances” declared by Trump, this would make a lot of sense to all the right people.
Putting together Trump’s Presidential Cabinet in Exile would be simple, too.
There are typically 15 members in the president’s cabinet. Trump could just fill many of these positions with members of his own family and perhaps one or two members of the Trump organization and with whatever wealthy Russians he now owes or will owe money to.
Edward Snowden, already in exile in Russia, will be appointed Chief of National Security in Exile.
And Kellyanne Conway? Obviously, she’ll be the new Press Secretary in Exile.
Pence may or may not tag along. It doesn’t matter either way. Everyone knows that veeps are easy to find.
Meanwhile back in the US, don’t expect many of the current crop of Republican “leaders” to muster the courage to say anything sterner than “Oh, my, that’s regrettable” when asked about the President in Exile … at least, not until they sense that their constituents have come to fully grasp that they’ve been caught up in an incident orchestrated from the Kremlin for the Kremlin’s own purposes.
The obvious place to install Trump and the rest of the President in Exile’s cabinet, court and administrators would be Tsaritsyno Palace in Moscow (shown above). It would make for a luxurious new White House for them all.
And Tsaritsnyno Palace offers all sorts of gorgeous and commanding venues from which President-in-Exile Trump can host press conferences. That way he can comment on all the happenings back in the US with President Clinton and her successors if and when he doesn’t feel like Tweeting anymore.
Trump and Putin naturally will deny the legitimacy of any future US president until Trump gets his four years.
And, well, only a “loser” gets just four years, Trump will say. So in the newly declared emergency exile circumstances, Trump will find it prudent to serve eight years. Or longer.
Trump’s escape from the US will become the stuff of legend and serve as a rallying point for all the good folks left behind, waiting for their beloved God Emperor Trump to return.
Trump supporters will lovingly share images of long-range Russian Sukhoi Su-34 fighter planes, the same planes that dramatically protected Trump’s personal jet shortly after it cleared US airspace and flew him to his new palace.
Legends of dogfights between the Sukhoi fighters and US Navy fighter jets can crackle over the wires of the Alt Right Internet, as administered by Trump goon, the Breitbart chief Stephen Bannon.
It will seem more and more amazingly heroic with each retelling of the fictional event.
After Putin installs him as US President in Exile, Trump will join the long list of history’s romantic exile heroes, from Bonny Prince Charlie to Kaiser Wilhelm II.
Stories of theTrump saga will merge with theirs, eventually turning into a piece of art resembling Homer’s Odyssey.
Glorious, isn’t it?
Or maybe not.
US security services have already reported the lengths to which Russian security has been willing to go to help Trump. If they can hack American voting machines, no doubt they will do so.
And things must be looking pretty desperate and urgent to Putin and his cronies at this point. Putin’s favorite sycophant seems to be faltering the polls. And you know what desperate times call for.
Listen. US security services now publicly conclude that Putin’s main goal in intervening in the US elections has been to shake faith in representative democracy.
If that was Putin’s aim, he’s going gangbusters.
And if Putin can name and host the first US president in exile, he will be able to shake representative democracy to its core — in a way no power or personality has ever been able to do before.
You know, it’s probably a good thing that Vladimir Putin was only a lieutenant colonel in the KGB during the Cold War.
Because whatever you want to call Putin, he’s no dummy.
For aNewDomain Politics, I’m Tom Ewing.
Credits:
Cover collage of Trump speaking at Tsaritsnyno Palace next to statue of Catherine the Great by Tom Ewing for aNewDomain, All Rights Reserved.
Collage of Putin and Trump: by Tom Ewing for aNewDomain, All Rights Reserved.
Photo of Tsaritsnyno Palace By Marina Lystseva – http://album.foto.ru/photo/218655/, CC BY-SA 3.0, Link
News 2019 image of Trump and Putin: KnowYourMeme.com, All Rights Reserved.
