Did Trump Have Russian Help in the Primaries?

The penny has dropped.

Trump has likely been the Russians' candidate from Day One.

When was Day One? Could it have been — hold your breath! — as early as the GOP primaries? It was certainly earlier than the June 2016 meeting Donald Jr. had with the Russians to get "some dirt" from them on Hillary Clinton.

The penny dropped for me last Friday night when Rachel Maddow pointed out that Trump had given a list of five names to the editorial board of the Washington Post back when he was interviewed as a candidate, these five being his "foreign policy team". Maddow noted two things about these five men: (1) no one had ever heard of any of them, and (2) we now know that each of the five has a connection to the Russians.

The picture of the Russians owning the Trump folks keeps growing.* (See footnote)  The Russian collection of Trumpies apparently even reached far enough in his orbit to include those on his "foreign policy team". It was a wide circle and it began early. He had these five names before newspaper endorsements were made. Compare that with how slow he was to name staff after the election. Even now most of the upper posts at the State Department lack nominees.

Not only is virually everybody associated with Trump also associated with the Russians, but the Russians own Trump and his cohorts. We know from the investigations already made public that the Russians have bought Trump with huge loans when his repeated bankruptcies lost him access to credit in America. We also know the Russians bought Trump's campaign manager, Paul Manaford, with a huge fee for doing Russian dirty work in Ukrainian politics. And we know about Mike Flynn's pay-offs from the Russians. As for Donald Trump, Jr., he boasted several years ago that "85% of our earnings come from Russia." And Trump's son-in-law, Jared Kushner, owes millions to the Russians.  All this is old news. To help facilitate some of these wheelings and dealings, a servor for Russia's biggest bank, one controlled by Putin, sat in the Manhattan Trump Tower that is home to Donald Trump. Pretty handy?

Everyone seems to assume that the Russian approach to Trump and his cohorts began in June 2016 with the "dangle" of some kind of trade for the dirt on Hillary Clinton. But why assume that was the actual beginning of the Russian presence? Looking back now, I see what struck me as odd about the reply emails from Kushner on the proposed June meeting: there was no expression of surprise.  Wouldn't you be a bit startled if you got an email from someone telling you that the Russians want to help you out with some important aspect of your life? I think I'd say   — and likely you would too —" The Russians? Why the Russians? Why me?" Especially concerning an American election! Who next? The Martians?

Donald Jr. just took it in stride. As did campaign manager Manaford and Trump son-in-law Kushner. Sure, the Russians. Of course, the Russians. Why not the Russians? Because, after all, they have been with us all along. 

When did the Russians decide to take over Trump and his campaign? I don't know, but I'll bet the farm it was before June 2016. Does it matter when they stepped in? Maybe. WAfter all, we need to know more about what they have done in our democratic politics, and the "when" may be an important clue as to the "what".  It certainly is a good thing that special prosecutor Robert Mueller is digging into Trump's earlier business history. We need to know when the Russian net closed around Trump and his minions so we can assess what that connection may have cost our election process.

Here's a question that no one has yet raised publicly: Did the Russian intrusion begin early enough to help Trump win the primaries?

Maybe the GOP could get more interested in the investigation of this mess if they began to suspect that they too had been victimized by Putin and his cohorts.

Oh, Lord, I'm 81 but I'm not ready to go! I want to see how this all turns out!

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* Just when I finished this, the NY Times identified yet another Russian who was present at the June 2016 Trump campaign meeting. The article describes his background in computer hacking. Isn't it possible the Russians were offering the Trump people hacking services that were more than the just material previously hacked? Were they offering the on-going services of the Russian described in this article, the hacking manager himself, to get into the American election process? To get into our voting machines? Lobbyist at Trump Campaign Meeting Has a Web of Russian ...

The plot sickens!