Bomber Bolton cashes in

Submitted by AWL on 24 June, 2020 - 8:06 Author: Barrie Hardy
Bolton and Trump

Things haven't been turning out well lately for Donald Trump in the run up to the US presidential election in November.

A pandemic that has claimed over 120,000 lives and is plateauing rather than declining. Major demonstrations against racial injustice and police brutality. An economy where unemployment rates have surpassed even those of the Great Depression of the 1930s.

On top of it all comes another book about chaos in the Trump White House. This time it's not second hand stuff from a liberal journalist, but a damning first hand account from right-wing maverick John Bolton.

For several decades Bolton has been the warmongering outrider of American politics. His appointment by Trump as National Security Advisor in April 2018 led many to fear that Bolton was close to achieving his desire to have the USA go to war with Iran. Bolton lasted longer than most, surviving in post for nearly a year and a half before Trump fired him.

In Bolton's opinion, Trump's foreign policy was not "hawkish" enough. Trump got rid of him because he didn't want another foreign military involvement on the scale of Iraq or Afghanistan.

Bolton's revenge on Trump for failing to start more wars comes in the form of a $2 million book deal where the corruption, incompetence and ignorance of the Trump administration are laid bare.

Trump is soft on dictators. Turkey's Erdoğan is offered help to circumvent an investigation into money laundering conducted by the Southern District of New York. It involves sanctions busting with Iran, which contravenes US foreign policy.

With China we have Trump begging Xi to help him get re-elected by having China buy soya beans and wheat from US farmers. As if by way of exchange Trump gives his approval for the mass internment of Uyghur people in camps as "the right thing to do" and a pledge not to raise the Tiananmen massacre because "it was years ago."

Trump also opined that journalists should be executed. No doubt he envied the fact that, unlike him, Saudi tyrant Mohammed bin Salman was in a position to do just that. That Trump only cares his own survival and that of his family of grifters is hardly a shocking revelation.

Democrat anger at Bolton for failing to testify to all this during the impeachment hearings is also understandable. He preferred to wait until he could cash in on his book, although the chances of the Republican Senate dethroning Trump even with his testimony would still have been slim.

Whether or not Bolton's book will cut any ice with American public opinion is another matter. Trump's core vote remains loyal despite the substantial lead in the polls Biden currently enjoys.

Nevertheless, many American voters are suffering from "Trump fatigue". They watch the half empty Trump rally in Tulsa and see it as akin to the gathering of a suicide cult. Unlike Jonestown where "Kool Aid" was passed around to largely unknowing victims, Trump's gathering had the coronavirus circulating, but the attendees were oblivious to the risk.

His diehard "base" aren't bothered by that, but voters who in 2016 were prepared to "give him a chance to shake up the system" are.

The hospital bills for Covid-19 are coming in, some of them running into seven figures. The lack of a socialised medical system is a key issue for socialists to campaign on.

Trump's rule has been socialism for the rich and capitalism for the poor. The corporations have seen huge tax cuts and bail outs, whilst millions of Americans are threatened with affordable health care being stripped from them if Trump gets a second term.

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