On November 6th, Putin Gave the Kremlin Staff the Day off
The word is, he was so happy that he even did a few shots of vodka.
Vladimir Putin isn’t a drinker. It is water whenever we see him sipping champagne at events or downing shots of vodka with his “heroic” killers from the front. Putin is afraid of losing control because then his fear of everything increases. He is also afraid someone will try to poison him.
By noon on November 6th in Moscow, it was obvious that Donald Trump would be the next president. Moscow is eight hours ahead of the U.S. Trump’s victory is one of the most positive and long-awaited developments in Russia’s losing war with Ukraine. Unable to defeat the Ukrainian army on the battlefield and incapable of weakening the Western alliance, Putin needed “one of his own” in the White House. Donald Trump’s victory was comparable to the United States Expeditionary Force joining the French side in World War I. The introduction of so many fresh troops, “the Doughboys,” in 1917 was the blow that convinced the German general’s victory would not be realized. From the moment most of the two million men were in place on the battlefields, it would be months before the bloodiest war the world had seen up to that moment would be over — November 11, 1918.
We will never know what Putin has on Trump, and seemingly, it doesn’t matter to most Americans that the next president is an agent of the Kremlin, but Trump’s ascension to the White House returns to the bowels of U.S. power a stupid criminal who regards Putin as a “good person worthy of emulation.” Since the beginning of Russia’s war with Ukraine, we have seen horrible atrocities committed by Russians against innocent Ukrainians, and yet, none of that evil registers with Trumpists. The Trumpists in Congress wanted to stop aid to Ukraine. The Trumpists in society, the voters, wanted the U.S. to ally with Russia because Zelenskey, Fox News told them, was corrupt — remember, it was Trump’s blackmail of Zelensky that resulted in his first impeachment.
In a celebratory mood, Vladimir Putin trucked tanks with helium to the Kremlin and set up cotton candy and balloon blow-up stations throughout the labyrinth-like hallways. It was giddy, heady, and an admission that a major breakthrough was underway in the quagmire that the war in Ukraine had become for Putin. The Kremlin stated after Putin called Trump to congratulate him that “a new world order is dawning.” The suggestion was that the failures of globalization led by the anachronistic vision of Democrats had been swept aside. Great countries, Putin suggested, would again rule the world without interfering in each other’s internal affairs.
In other words, when Trump begins building camps first to imprison immigrants and then his political opposition, a peep would not be heard from Moscow. In other words, Donald says, “Go crazy, pal. It’s your country, and you are the supreme leader. The Congress is yours and is loyal to you. The people are dumb and pliable. They will believe anything you tell them, and if they doubt you, you have a complicit media to back up your lies. Soon, people will stand up at attention just like you wanted, buddy. Flak v ruki (Go crazy, in Russia)!”
Some pro-Putin friends from Russia reached out to me yesterday.
“See, even your fellow citizens know that Biden and NATO are wrong and that we were right to defend ourselves.”
Others in Russia are already planning on becoming again a part of a new alliance that includes China, Iran, and the U.S. against the remaining and failing liberal
democracies.
Many Republicans who don’t like Trump and maybe even voted for Kamilla Harris — although I don’t think many did vote for her given how thoroughly she was beaten — will hold out until the end, denying that what is happening is happening. They will deny that we are now allies with Russia and view NATO as a potential enemy. They will keep holding on because most still get their information from Fox.
It’s almost 3 p.m. in Moscow right now. As Putin winds down another week in the Kremlin, he is sitting uncharacteristically with his feet on the desk — most cultures regard showing the bottom of one’s shoes as a very uncultured thing to do — and leaning back in his chair. Balancing the chair, he leans forward and removes a small bottle of vodka from a drawer. He pours out a shot.
Buzzing his secretary, “Marina, bring me a couple of pickles and a slice of bread from my stash. The code is 2232Y.” (I imagine he has his own snacks locked up and coded.)
She enters. “Pour yourself a shot, Marina.” She does as commanded.
“I mean, would you like one? You don’t have to if you don’t want to.” She notices he seems happier.
“No, no. I want one, Vladimir Vladimirovich.”
They throw back the shots, lift the slices of bread to their noses, and inhale heartily. As we pan out from this small scene, and the screens fade to black, a spec on the lens of history, we hear the pleasant crunching of pickles.
“Have a good weekend, Marina.”
“You too, Vladimir Vladimirovich.”
“Oh, I will…I will,” he giggles.