THE MIDTERMS EXPLAINED

THE ABSURD TIMES

Illustration:  The future of the Democratic Party

(She was so popular, she not only defeated a long time establishment Democrat, but was also elected in an adjacent precinct in w2hich she was not running and had to decline.)

U.S. Elections Explained

by

Czar Donic

Of course, there is more going on here than just the elections, but they were significant, although puzzling for those in other countries who keep hearing about "Democracy".  So, We are are going to try to unravel a few things here.

Trump fired the Attorney General, Jeff Sessions.  Someone remarked that it is the only monument to the Confederacy that Trump has touched so far.  Now, according to our Constitution, the Attorney General must be confirmed by the Senate before he can take any action or even take office.  However, his replacement has not been confirmed by the Senate (despite the fact that Trump says he has and also that he does not know who he is).  Hey, I shit you not.  He actually said both things, both of which are lies.  The biggest problem Trump had with Sessions is that he recused himself from the Russia investigation (as was legally required).  Otherwise, he has been the prefect Trump follower and a huge disaster for the United States.  There is, in fact, no downside to the departure of Sessions under these circumstances.

In the middle of all this, I was reminded of a song from the Watergate era, but cannot remember the name of the writer.  He had tried to fill the vacancy left by Tom Lehrer, but it was impossible.  Still, the lyrics stay with me and the tune is in ¾ time, Andante:

We're Haldeman, Erlichman, Mitchell, and Dean,

The way we've been treated is simply obscene.

Who would have thought a thing like a bug

Would wind up getting us kicked in the Jug?

Dean has since turned into a fairly astute political analyst.  I have heard that only two Attorneys General have been convicted, but I can only remember Mitchell and the strange dopped up and alcohol inspired late night calls from Marth Mitchell that proved to be the most incisive comments to come from that group.

At any rate, there is talk that the investigation into the Russia situation will be stopped, but we should keep in mind that Mueller has been well prepared for such an eventuality.  In addition, he is currently writing up his final report.  The real danger is the possible destruction of documents by Republican operatives.

There is some speculation of what can be done to redraw districts.  See, in the U.S., voting districts are based on the census and then drawn to bias elections in favor of one party or another.  The last time, the Republican Party drew them.  Replacing the Attorney General the way Trump wants is clearly unconstitutional, so what would be a constitutional way to end not voter fraud, but election fraud?  In fact, first Trump declared that he knew him well and he had been seen in the Oval Office repeatedly.  Then, to show how impartial he is, Trump claimed not to know the replacement.  The fact that he knows nothing about a nominee is the best reason he can give for his choice.

Well, there is no Constitutional provision for Political Parties (other than freedom of assembly in the First Amendment) and at one time the Communist Party was outlawed in America.  Well, if that was constitutional, then so would be making the Republican Party illegal.  It is worth considering.  Is the Republican Party an Enemy of the People?  It certainly supports corporate interests over people's interests.  In fact, they could join the Democrat Party and we could establish a Democratic Socialist party for the moderate and progressives.  

Of course, that would be a mistake now that Democrats hold enough State power to redraw thos districts.  Instead, these (pardon the expression) Republicans would be renamed the Whigs or perhaps the Tea Party.  This is not the first time that the party has been so facistic.  For example, when JFK was running against Nixon, this party begaan to change drastically.  After Dulles and Company had JFK killed, people were left with a choice between Barry Goldwater, supported by the John Birch Party, and who said his solution to the Vietnam War was to bomb Hanoi into the stone age.  Well, that left LBJ to take over and the party to begin to fall apart, expecially a few years later with Watergate.  Who was behind the John Birch Society?  Mr. Koch Sr.  Yes, the father to the current Koch brothers who founded the tea party.  This is the party that had people so stirred up that one of the people shouted out at Arlen Specter  of Pennsylvania that he should "keep you government hands off my Social Security!"  He became a Democrat.  This is the guy who devised the "single-bullet theory of how JFK died and even he was too liberal for the tea party.  Whigs, Tories, Birchers, whatever would be a better name for that party and it could be done just as the Communist party was outlawed.

CNN remains the "Enemy of the People," a term Stalin used to employ before he sent people to Siberia.  Someone said that Jim Acosta, a reporter for CNN was not a hero because he was only doing his job when a White House intern attempted to wrest the microphone from him because he was asking questions that Trump didn't like.  Nevertheless, under the current administration, any reporter who is doing his or her job is a hero.  (Either that, or an Enemy of the People.)

At the same Press conference, he was asked about the implications of his use of the term "Nationalist" as it is potentionally racist.  The reporter, a block woman, was then accused of asking racist questions.  Thus, another Enemy of the people.  He asked if he was racist, why he has the higest approval ranking from African Americans in history.  Well, I didn't know he did, and I have no answer if that is true.  Stupidity is the only answer that comes to mind as he constantly refers to blacks as "Low IQ".  Whose stupidity is another question.

There has been a great deal of talk from Trump on how effective his endorsements have been.  In fact, only 28% of those candidates he endorsed won.  On the other hand, the Democrats won 38 seats in the House of Representatives, the highest in four decades.  The only other time they did this well was after Nixon and Watergate.  It did not help that Ford had to debate Jimmie Carter who had a brain, either. 

Many of the newest Representatives are "progressives," more of the Bernie Sanders faction, the Social Democrats, rather than the establishment faction.  They are a part of the "Resist" movement.  Incidentally, at one time Hillary Clinton tried to claim she was a part of that faction until others in that faction told her "you are one of the things were are trying to resist."  The best that can be said for her is that she would not have been as bad for the country as Trump.  If that is her claim, she is welcome to it, although who knows what she would have done in foreign policy?  Above is a photo of the newest type of person that will represent the Democratic party (if the know what is good for them).

DONALD TRUMP:,DEPLORABLE BULLY

THE ABSURD TIMES

TRUMP:  OUR FACE TO THE WORLD
@honestcharlie  [twitter]

Trump and how he makes us look:  DONALD TRUMP: DEPLORABLE BULLY
If you need a compendium of facts and data concerning what Trump means or represents, this is the only account you can trust.  

I remember vividly a recent march, not for women's rights, or justice, or some other such cause, but a march in favor of FACTS!!!  Now just let that sink in for a second.  Who in their right mind would oppose facts?  Did you ever think that it would be a time to actually march or demonstrate in favor of facts?  The entire thing is absurd.

In fact, some time ago, we decided to cut way back, even cease or suspend publication as absurdity had become so obvious that we were not need in order for them to be recognized.  There are simply too many to keep up with.

Well, in the excerpt for the book cited below, Dennis Campbell and his team of "Muckrakers," a lovely and forgotten word evoking the days when news mattered, you can see what is in the one book I recommend. 

A few words about Denis himself: his biography is included below, but there are a few things I would like to add.  For example, he is well conversant with both United States and British Culture.  He spent some time as an MP in England as a Lib Dem.   While that party did little but give the conservative government a majority, its politics were not at all conservative.  It was actually high time that the so-called "New Labor" personified by the glib Tony Blair was ousted and given a chance to become the Labor Party again. He resigned his career in professional politics to return to journalism.

At one point I became aghast at the idiocy of the two women running to head the Conservative Party.  The one who lost actually said that she was a better candidate because she had given birth and implied that no other qualification was needed.  He actually brought that up on his podcast with his fellow journalists who actually thought I had made it up.  Nope, things were that bad in England that sane people could not believe it.  Well, it turns out that Brits had enough sense to realize how absurd things had become and yet many were surprised when Jeremy Corbyn, sort of a Bernie Sanders in the states, won his party's leadership swimmingly, so to speak.  The current Prime Minister called an early election and people were amazed at how she just managed to squeak by with the narrowest of margins as Mr. Corbyn opposed her. 

At any rate, here is a bit of the book and what it's about (he sent me this in a pdf file and this is the best I've been able to convert it, sorry sport!):




DONALD TRUMP:
DEPLORABLE BULLY
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Denis G. Campbell is the author of nine books on politics, business and personal development.  For two decades, he continues to provide global political and business commentary to dozens of broadcast outlets and numerous newspapers and magazines. He is under contract to four international television, and five global radio, properties.  He is founder and editor of UKProgressive.co.uk Magazine and Producer/co-host of The Three Muckrakers, a weekly political show that for three years has covered US, UK, EU and international politics.  He spent the last 14 years living and writing in Wales, United Kingdom from the seaside villages of Ogmore by Sea and Monknash.
Denis is a global business consultant in London, Singapore, Beijing, Washington, Miami and Los Angeles.
He was a director with Price Waterhouse and a business and
regulatory lobbyist in Washington DC and LA. He is the
managing director of the global consultancy Target Point
Ltd.
He is an Honors graduate of Boston College and has lectured at the Universities of Miami, Maryland, Johns Hopkins, American University (Washington, DC and Beirut), Erasmus Universiteit in Rotterdam, Zayed University in Dubai, UCLA, UWIC, Cardiff University, and others, on politics and business topics.  A dual British and US national, he lives and writes high atop the cliffs of the historic Glamorgan Heritage Coast.
Please follow him on:
·    Twitter – @ukprogressive
·    Facebook – Denis G. Campbell: World
Politics Series
·    Instagram – ukprogressive


…SEVEN MONTHS HAVE AGED US…
The worry over what this angry, bullying, petulant, tweeting man-child will do next, scares us to death.  We are grateful for Sundays because that seems to be the only day in ANY week where we can catch our breath for about ten hours before he careens off, bored at the "dump" of a White House he feels he is forced to live in, and creates his next crisis. He has spent almost 60 days of the 230 or so in office at one of his hotel or golf properties.
There is a feckless meanness to every action he takes that terrifies us. He has been completely enabled by the mainstream media and a Republican tea party that turns its head the other way, sticks its fingers in its ears and sing, "La-la-laaa, I'm not listening!"
This book should have been written during the presidential campaign. Let me explain why wasn't.  In 2012, I wrote four books from various stops along the campaign trail. I followed the then "seven dwarfs," traditional Republican candidates standing that year against President Obama.
It was a traditional, conservative, red-meat feast within the Republican/GOP/Tea Party (they are by the way, one and the same. I use the terms interchangeably and the letters GOP stand for its nickname, the Grand Old Party). They followed predictable culture war memes in 2012. It all felt quite sane and digestible.  Seven candidates fought each other for the right to challenge a very popular President Obama in November.  It was orderly. It was measured. There was time to think and react to the news of the day. You could go out for lunch and know you would not miss earth-shattering headlines during that hour.
2016, however, was nightmare-inducingly insane.  There were literally no words to describe a 71-yearold man-child wandering around the world in his pajamas, yelling and tweeting at the world.
3
Forget a 24-hour news cycle. Trump made sure this was a two-hour, peripatetic, never-ending news cycle.  And his presidency continues down the same exhausting path. A month of activity in Trumpville can be measured in dog years.
So much crazy occurs in any 24-hour cycle, that every time I sat down to write about a topic, seven other things would happen to throw me off the scent due to the sheer frenetic pace.
The plan for 2016 was to do a reprise…sit and write four 60-page books and combine them at the end into a recap. That was made impossible in January of 2016 when seventeen candidates entered the race. And, if we were playing chess, Trump strode in like a carnival barker and threw the board and pieces into the air. He was a tweeting, insulting, exhausting, childish, pedantic, peripatetic, attention-seeking, whore-mongering celebrity who made any serious, real-issue discourse impossible.
And he was winning.
He was the perfect candidate for our social-mediafilled, celebrity-obsessed, culture. The media helped to create him, then complained about his antics. Every time he spoke it was like watching the 1970s E.F. Hutton television commercials: "When E. F. Hutton talks, people listen." Everyone fell silent to see what worldsalad nonsense Trump would release.
The campaign threw all political and journalistic science out the window. Indeed, it set the window and the house on fire. Forget discussing issues. This was a 140-character assault, aided and abetted by a complicit and pandering mainstream media. Everyone's senses and sensibilities were under constant emotional attack. You didn't know what to believe any more and you just wanted it all to stop.
Rather than discuss issues, this was the politics of Twitter and personal attack. That ensured any reasonable and qualified candidate would fall quickly by the wayside.
4
It was political campaign as reality show. Survivor on steroids, as each week another candidate was voted off the island.
In January, prohibitive favorite Jeb Bush was struggling. Just like his brother before him in 2000, the GOP establishment lined up with checkbooks in hand to give him a huge financial lead. More than $100m was in his war chest.
He did poorly in Iowa. But no worries, the Bushes always were uncompetitive in that state's corrupt beauty contest caucus system. He was still tapped as the prohibitive populist favorite in New Hampshire and South Carolina. These were the first real contests where the Bush family name and history always resonated with establishment Republicans.
So, Jeb pretty much ignored Iowa. Rose above the fray in the debates when Donald attacked him as "lowenergy Jeb" and got his ass whupped but good. Trump was landing massive body blows in the fight. Jeb brought a butter knife to a gun fight and he never recovered.  The fight was personal, nasty, and completely off most campaign operative's scripts. Jeb's team were like a production crew in the booth trying to find their place in the script and advance the teleprompter fast enough. It was classic Donald Trump.
Trump had no campaign staff. He conducted no opposition research. Produced no polls. Didn't buy any advertising. And yet he won New Hampshire in a field of fourteen candidates with 35% of all votes cast.  Jeb Bush gave lengthy policy speeches. Trump did pep rallies attacking his opponent and Hillary Clinton.  Bush finished a distant fourth behind Trump, Kasich and Cruz with only 11% of the vote.
South Carolina was to be Jeb's firewall. This was where he would spend every penny of what he had left to get on the field and in the game. He did even worse.  Jeb finished fourth again in a winner-take-all primary. In delegates, Trump led 61-3. The rout was on. $100m of 5 organization and media time bought Jeb two embarrassing fourth place finishes. He dropped out of the race a few days later.
Trump sold massive amounts of merchandise. His red Make America Great Again (MAGA) hats were a profit-making arm of his branding business. With no hint of irony, they were made in China and shipped by the container-load. Trump sold his hats and filled up arenas with angry supporters. Aside from arena rentals, his biggest campaign expense was merchandise, but it was income, not expense. Trump was about to run the first political campaign in history that made a profit for all his businesses.
His opponents were barnstorming across states with multiple stops each day. Trump showed up for one big event a day. The news media followed and usually broadcast it live because no one knew what he would say next. Trump was ratings gold because he was so unpredictable.
The rules of campaigning no longer applied. Nothing he said was outrageous enough to disqualify him because he was not a politician. He did what he wanted, when he wanted, how he wanted.
A Missouri politician in 2012 was crushed in his
Senate election when he uttered the words "legitimate
rape." Donald Trump bragged about "grabbing women
by the pussy." And yet, he won.
Most thought his stunts on the campaign trail were him just doing what he felt he had to do win the election.  Almost every pundit said, "Once there, the gravity of the office is such he would have to pivot towards running the country and become much more presidential." We were all very, very wrong.
The mainstream media ate his act up. He was the perfect candidate for our times. An internet troll who spoke his mind. People identified with that. I would reply during numerous interviews trying to explain that, "Look, my uncle speaks his mind too. That doesn't mean 6 he is qualified to be president."
At the end of the campaign, it was estimated that while other candidates spent millions on television and online advertising, Trump earned a massive $2.4bn in free advertising as his Trump-branded Boeing 757 pulled up to airport hangars filled with his supporters. Every media outlet covered each move and word. The media even covered his attacks against them for being fake news.  He'd bound off his jet, speak for 40 minutes and then fly home to sleep each night in his own bed.  Journalists and campaign operatives were befuddled.
It worked. He got the lion's share of the media coverage.  He also knew better than anyone how to touch a midwestern rust belt, racist, anti-immigration, raw, aggrieved white person's nerve. It was like what UKIP did in 2016 in the United Kingdom over Brexit.
The stream of angry @realDonaldTrump tweets was relentless; five new crises would befall the campaign daily over them. And, somehow, at the end of each day, despite condemnation by the other candidates and the President, he would move on untouched in the eyes of his base to fight another day.
His fans liked him because he was a straight shooter, despite the serial lies. He convinced people in closed factory towns that he would fight for them no matter what. He converted solid former Democratic Party voters, upset that their candidate Hillary was ignoring them and their plight. They wanted to send a message to Washington to focus on matters here in our country.  When the General Election votes were tallied, a mere 80,000 out of the more than 120,000,000 votes cast, decided three key industrial states. Ohio, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin were reliably blue states that were angry no one in either party was listening to them. Despite an overall national majority of 3,000,000 votes, Hillary lost these three states and, as a result, the Electoral College vote. That was the ballgame.
Trump was the only candidate who consistently 7 showed up at airports. He would pledge that he, and he alone, would help them, bring back manufacturing jobs and solve their problems. A huge majority believed him despite pledges that proved to be campaign-trail lies at Carrier Air Conditioning and other locations.  The more outrageous Donald Trump behaved, the crazier the coverage became of his airplane landing in a new city. That led to bigger voter turnouts for him in those primary states. He was Britain's Nigel Farage writ large. A place for voters to, at first, lodge a protest vote and a personality everyone wanted to want to have a pint with…if he drank.
Then, something funny happened. Hard-working folks believed he could win. They ignored Trump's oftrepeated lies as "fake news." He was as charismatic to them as a travelling Baptist preacher. He pledged to "drain the swamp" and clean up Washington. He would be the working white man's champion.  They believed his hype and refused anything that resembled a provable contrarian fact. They did not want to know, nor did they care, about his past. He alone would shake up Washington and bring change. This was a television reality star unleashing every trick in the book to build an audience.
And it worked.
No one in the political world understood what he was doing or how he did it. This was largely because no one knew what he would do next. His rallies gained steam and attracted thousand to venues. He placed the press in pens like circus animals, then blamed them for poor coverage, and called out reporters by name. They were subjected to incredible abuse online and offline from his minion followers and Russian social media bots.  He incited violence. Told supporters to "Knock the crap out of protestors," and that he would "Pay their legal bills," which, of course, he never did. The mediacreated monster climbed atop the Empire State Building swatting away the heavy artillery aimed at him.
8
At the point of writing this book, we are 45 weeks into an improbable election win and presidency. We start 12 days before the election with a real October surprise, assisted by then FBI Director, James Comey. He announced a reopening of the Hillary Clinton email investigation. That saw her go overnight from a 10-point lead in the polls to a loss.
She never got back on the front foot and Trump used his time in those last few days to beat "Crooked Hillary," and "Lock her up!" drums. Despite her being cleared a second time a few days before the election, the damage was done. Hillary was a dead woman walking.  The book ends with a Friday night news dump as Hurricane Harvey hits Texas, Sheriff Joe Arpaio is pardoned, a detailed memo to the military demands they ban the service of transgender troops in the US military, Trump then clumsily handled the Harvey relief efforts, and his decision to end the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program meant new chaos and fear on the immigration front. DACA temporarily lifted the threat of deportation for immigrants brought to the US before they were 16 now Trump was ending the programme and threatening them with deportation.  Oh, and a Category 5 hurricane, Irma, was taking dead aim at Florida and there still were no leaders heading The Federal Emergency Management agency (FEMA), National Oceanic and Atmospheric Agency (NOAA) or the Department of Homeland Security since John Kelly was elevated to be his Chief of Staff.
The Three Muckrakers
For three years, I have produced a weekly current affairs programme and iTunes podcast in the United Kingdom called The Three Muckrakers. Our first broadcast was on the day of the 2015 Scottish Referendum to leave the UK. 133 episodes later, we have broadcast 44 weeks/year 9 covering US Congressional and Presidential Elections;
Brexit; the devolved government elections for Wales, Northern Ireland and Scotland; elections in France, The Netherlands, Germany and other EU states; and two UK General Elections.
I am joined weekly in the studio by the political and religious commentator, Paul Halliday. Past co-presenters included co-founders: Phil Parry, former BBC anchor and editor of The Eye Investigates and Dr. Dario Llinares, senior lecturer in media at The University of Brighton.  Many weeks we have been joined by as many as 40 news and thought leaders on various topics including:
North Korea; Mexican-American discrimination in the USA; healthcare; environment and anti-fracking; US, Dutch, UK and EU members of Parliament and Congress. We discuss political developments weekly in the US, UK and around the globe.
The as-aired scripts and topic rundowns form the basis of this book. It was, frankly, the only way we could keep up with the breathtakingly-mindless pace and continual misdirection, smoke and mirrors of this new administration.
Shameful "45"
In the USA, President Trump is often referred to as "45", his number in the line of presidential succession.  (Washington was number 1, Lincoln, 16, and Obama was 44).
It's been 45 shameful weeks of President 45. They truly feel like 45 months or even 45 years. It has been a wild ride so far. We will look at:
·    The Russian election hack and cozy Putin relationship.
·    The Mueller investigation.
·    The former MI-6 agent Christopher Steele's
10 dossier and related crimes that, even if pardoned, will continue in New York state.
·    His fight with the intelligence community.
·    Cabinet officers who fill vs "Drain the
Swamp."
·    His tweets and their aftermath.
·    The Charlottesville racist protest and death led by white supremacists / neo-Nazis.
·    His limited vocabulary and speech
schizophrenia.
·    "The Wall" and immigration.
·    His personal attacks on eleven US senators…in his own party!
·    The Administration labelling any news it does not like as "Fake News" and their dishonest media attacks backfiring spectacularly.
·    Hurricanes Harvey, Irma and Maria: Trump's
Katrinas.
·    Trump as a totalitarian leader, whipping up his
base and dividing the nation.
Let's start with how we got here.

Putin, Hacking, Trump, and Democratic Priorities

THE ABSURD TIMES

Illustration: Latuff.  Here just because it is.  We seem to have forgotten about Palestine.

One of the more unfortunate results of this election, along with the alledged Russian "hacks," (perhaps "Leaks" would be a more precise word), is that one informed and sane "Liberals" and even "Progressives" feel free now to lash out not at the DNC and the way it ran the last election, but to instead turn their ire towards Assad and Putin.  Moreover, they can feel nice and patriotic about it at the same time.  

Facts are is short supply concerning the recent events in Aleppo, but we were first told that it was Al-Nusra that had held Aleppo, evil terrorists.  Now, all of a sudden, it is bold and brave "Rebels," a term that conjures thoughts of our war of independence for England in the 18^th century.  Now, poor helpless rebels, or innocent civilians (we invaded Libya to save "innocent civilians, remember?) are being tortured to death.  Oops, now they gave up and are being evacuated by international groups.

Palmyra just fell to ISIS, again.  How?  Well, they gave up on Mosul in Iraq and went there.  We could have knocked them out, but decided not to.

We have already discussed the Russians, the culturally and ethnically Russian citizens in Crimea who were, really, liberated and allowed to join the Russian Federation.   Anyone who felt out of place was allowed to leave with everything intact.  About 10 to 20% did. 

We have been though all of this, endlessly, before.  (See back issues of the past few years about it.)  The major point is that now that the idiot Trump is President Elect, Democrats feel free to attack Putin since, if you believe them, Putin got Trump elected! 

Trump has now gone on to appoint all sorts to vile characters to his cabinet.  The only good thing about all of this is that, just as the Republicans rebuilt their party along more sane policies, the Democrats have the same possibility.  If they listen to Sanders, Ellison, Warren, and a few others, the have a chance to become once again a Democratic party, not a semi-Republican one as it is now.  They need to look to themselves and let Trump and his gang worry about Putin.  Also, they need to present a united force against any attacks against social programs, "entitlements," which are actually necessities and, if the people are not entitled to them, why call them that?  There is where the party needs to focus. 

With the aid of Russian airstrikes, Syria has taken near full control of the city of Aleppo in a major defeat for forces hoping to topple Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. Before fighting began in 2012, Aleppo was Syria's largest city with a population of over 2 million. Some of the first major peaceful protests against Assad's rule broke out in Aleppo in March 2011. But today the city is in shambles after four years of fighting between Syria and rebel groups. A turning point in the battle of Aleppo occurred in September 2015, when Russia began carrying out airstrikes to aid the Syrian government. Russia described the fall of Aleppo as a victory against terrorists and jihadists. But the United States has decried the Russian-backed offensive. We host a debate between Kenneth Roth, executive director of Human Rights Watch, and Stephen Cohen, professor emeritus of Russian studies and politics at New York University and Princeton University.

---

TRANSCRIPT

This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.

AMY GOODMAN: With the aid of Russian airstrikes, Syria has taken near full control of the city of Aleppo in a major defeat for forces hoping to topple Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. Before fighting began in 2012, Aleppo was Syria's largest city, with a population of over 2 million. Some of the first major peaceful protests against Assad's rule broke out in Aleppo in March 2011. But today the city is in shambles, after four years of fighting between Syria and rebel groups. A turning point in the battle of Aleppo occurred in September 2015, when Russia began carrying out airstrikes to aid the Syrian government. Negotiations are now ongoing for a truce to allow the evacuation of civilians living in the areas once held by rebel forces. An initial truce collapsed earlier today. Ismail Alabdullah, a volunteer with the Syrian Civil Defense, or White Helmets, said civilians had been executed by government forces.

ISMAIL ALABDULLAH: When Assad's forces captured al-Bustan al-Qasr neighborhood and al-Fardos neighborhood, Assad's forces, when they entered—when they entered these neighborhoods, they executed 82 people. And the relatives of the victims, who are now with us, told us they were executed, including like 13 kids and seven women. All of them were executed. And what we are now—and what we worry about, about our [inaudible], that maybe the genocide—that genocide will happen in the coming days, if nothing will stop them in the coming hours.

AMY GOODMAN: Russia described the fall of Aleppo as a victory against terrorists and jihadists, but the United States has decried the Russian-backed offensive. U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Samantha Power said, quote, "Aleppo will join the ranks of those events in world history that define modern evil, that stain our conscience decades later—Halabja, Rwanda, Srebrenica and now Aleppo," unquote. The U.N. said at least 82 civilians, including women and children, have been shot on sight by Syrian government troops in recent days.

To talk more about Syria, as well as how the fall of Aleppo impacts U.S.-Russian relations, we're joined by two guests. Kenneth Roth is with us, executive director of Human Rights Watch. His new article for The New York Review of Books is headlined "What Trump Should Do in Syria." And Stephen Cohen also joins us, professor emeritus of Russian studies and politics at New York University and Princeton University. He's a contributing editor at The Nation magazine.

Welcome, both, to Democracy Now! Ken Roth, let's begin with you. What's happened in Syria? And talk about Russia's role.

KENNETH ROTH: Well, we're all focused on Aleppo right now. And I think, as you mentioned earlier, Aleppo has been the victim of several months of siege, basically a starvation of everybody there, not simply the fighters, but up to 250,000 civilians. It also has been the victim of ongoing bombardment by Syrian and Russian forces. And what's notable about the way this war has been fought—and Aleppo is no exception to this—is that the Syrian-Russian combination have not simply aimed at fighters on the other side, which is what you're supposed to do in war, but they have deliberately targeted civilians and civilian institutions, like hospitals or markets and the like. And the aim is to make life so miserable that people either flee or the enclave ultimately topples. That's been this tactic in other areas, and now that has been successful in Aleppo. This is an overt war crime strategy, and it's been Assad's method of fighting the war from the outset. And Russia very much joined it, when, a little over year ago, in September 2015, it joined in. We had all hoped at that stage that the greater precision that Russian Air Force brought to the fighting would enable a more targeted approach. In fact, they just continued the policy of targeting civilians.

Now, we had hoped, as of last night, that for the remaining civilians in Aleppo—as well as the fighters, apparently—that there would be an evacuation. That had been arranged. But this morning, Shia militia, backed by Iran, blocked that deal and resumed shelling the area. This is of deep concern because, as you heard from the White Helmet individual, there have been executions in Aleppo when pro-government forces have entered. They, in particular, have been targeting the families of fighters. These are well known, and they're going door to door and executing women and children, as well as others who are there. So there's deep concern that if the people who remain in eastern Aleppo cannot get out, that they, too, may face these kinds of summary executions.

AMY GOODMAN: So, are you accusing Russia and Syria of war crimes here?

KENNETH ROTH: Absolutely. In other words, I mean, the fighters on the ground today are principally either Syrian or—I mean, the other major forces that have been backing Syria on the ground have been Iran and Hezbollah. Russia has been playing mainly an aerial role. But it—and often you can't tell which plane is which. You know, there are various efforts. But the combination of the Assad-Putin air forces have been deliberately bombing civilians and civilian institutions, time and time again. You speak to people in hospitals who report being targeted over and over again, until ultimately the hospital is destroyed. And this, you know, sadly, has been the strategy that Putin and Assad have pursued in Syria. This is a blatant war crime. The Geneva Conventions require that you take all feasible precautions to spare civilians. In this case, the deliberate purpose has been to target civilians. It's a blatant war crime.

AMY GOODMAN: Professor Stephen Cohen?

STEPHEN COHEN: Is anybody here old enough to remember the expression "fog of war"? I think it may have originated in World War I. I'm not sure. But then, when you get a war, you have a very difficult time getting reliable information about what's going on.

There are several narratives about the Syrian civil proxy war—and that's what it is, a lot of great powers, or would-be great powers, involved in Syria. The United States and Russia are involved in a proxy war there. It's a civil war. The account Mr. Roth just gave is only one of two or three competing narratives. One narrative is—and in war, innocents die. That's why we're all antiwar. He says that the Russians joined with the Syrians in deliberate war crimes. This is based on very selective reports that come from sources that cannot be verified. For example, the White Helmet man, that you had testify to this, didn't tell us how he knew that, how he observed it, how he escaped with his own life. Moreover, there are people who doubt the reports that come from the White Helmets, that they have an agenda. So the rest of us are left here trying to weigh the different narratives. Mr. Roth's is a very extreme set of accusations. What Samantha Power has said at the United Nations, over a long period of time, can't be taken at face value, because she has performed there not as an ambassador, but as a propagandist for a certain point of view.

The problem here is, is that what's the alternative to ending the siege of Aleppo? Now, you, Amy, Mr. Roth and The New York Times have dropped the word "jihadist" and "terrorist" from your narrative. I don't know if you're aware you've done that. You may have done this because The New York Times, until September—why was September important? Because President Obama had proposed to join with President Putin in what Mr. Roth now calls war crimes—that is, a military alliance against the people who are holding Aleppo captive. And they called them terrorists. When our Department of Defense sabotaged that potential Russian-American alliance in Aleppo, in Syria, suddenly the narrative—and we're back to the fog of war—changed. The New York Times, for example, and many of us who depend on the Times or The Washington Post for our information, suddenly changed their narrative. There were no longer any terrorists in Aleppo, no longer any jihadists, but people called rebels. And since our nation began in rebellion against Great Britain, rebels have a rather positive connotation. The reality is, I think—at least this is what the United States government told us until September—that terrorists were holding large parts of eastern Aleppo. They were not letting innocent civilians use the multiple corridors out of the city that the Russians—yes, there's plenty of testimony to this—had opened up and guaranteed, that people could not escape the city because of these terrorists. Then, suddenly, when the American-Russian—Obama's plan to cooperate with Putin there disappeared, apparently all the jihadists and the terrorists disappeared.

So we're left today in a fog of war. Perhaps Mr. Roth is correct, but I don't think he's fully correct. And we have two narratives. Either we have witnessed the liberation of Aleppo, and then we would say this is a good thing, or we're witnessing war crimes by the Russians and the Syrians in Aleppo, which is a bad thing. So, I would ask Mr. Roth: If the Russians hadn't done what he alleged they would do, what was the alternative to setting the people of Aleppo free?

AMY GOODMAN: Ken Roth?

KENNETH ROTH: Let me begin with this fog of war argument, because, you know, when there's nothing to say, when there's nothing to defend, let's resort to the fog of war. I mean, I've heard this argument many, many times. This is not fog of war. We know exactly what is going on. Human Rights Watch has teams on the ground, based in Beirut, occasionally going into Syria, in regular communication with people in Aleppo, in other places. We don't publish until we know exactly what is going on, until we corroborate and we're certain. So this is not a matter of just, you know, taking some jihadist propagandist and repeating it. We know exactly what is happening. And there is no question that the bombardment has been targeting civilians and civilian institutions. There is no question that the siege was starving everybody, including a quarter of a million civilians. So, you know, fog of war? Please. You know, this is the reality.

Now, what—you know, what could have been done? We speak about terrorists, and so let's get specific here. When people use that term, they generally refer to two groups. One is the Islamic State, or ISIS. ISIS is actually not in Aleppo at all. The U.S., working with its Kurdish allies, is fighting ISIS, you know, in Iraq around Mosul and in Syria around Raqqa. And Russia, for the most part, and Assad have largely been ignoring that fight. They've been focusing on Aleppo. Now, in Aleppo, there are what are known as sort of the moderate rebels, and then there's a group that the United States agrees is a terrorist, is an al-Qaeda affiliate—until very recently, when it supposedly distanced itself from al-Qaeda—traditionally known as Jabhat al-Nusra. The Jabhat al-Nusra forces are a relatively small component of the people in Aleppo, but the U.S. has agreed with Russia that it would like to see those people defeated.

Now, you know, however you feel about that, however you feel about the other rebels, the issue is—here, is not who wins. The issue is the method of warfare. And the right way to proceed is you shoot at the combatants on the other side. That's what the laws of war are all about. Unfortunately, Putin and Assad have chosen to target the civilians who also live there. It's a very deliberate strategy: make life so miserable that ultimately the city has no choice but to capitulate.

Now, you know, there is tremendous fear on the part of civilians in all of these enclaves who are targeted, and they—on the one hand, they fear staying there, because they're facing the bombardment by the Russian and the Syrian troops; on the other hand, they fear going over into Syrian hands, because, you know, we know what happens in Syrian prisons. We've seen extensive torture and execution. We have photos of, you know, thousands of people who have died in those prisons. And so, if you're a young man, for example, you basically are facing a choice: You know, do you either risk your life in Assad's detention facilities, or—you know, what they're increasingly doing is forcing you to just get into the Syrian military and go to the front line—you know, essentially a suicide mission there. So, it is, you know, a very poor possibility. Now, many families are staying with their relatives who are fighters, and these are the people who are being first targeted by the pro-government forces that are coming in. So, we are—you know, this is not about how do you defeat terrorists. This is about slaughter of civilians. And we should keep that focus.

AMY GOODMAN: Slaughter of civilians. The United Nations calls it a meltdown of humanity. Stephen Cohen?

STEPHEN COHEN: Well, the United Nations has issued conflicting reports. There's a bit of a struggle at the United Nations about what to say about all this.

Look, Mr. Roth's organization does God's work. No question about it. But for millennia, we've argued exactly what God's work is. One can support what Human Rights Watch does, with great enthusiasm, make a donation, urge Mr. Roth on, and still question his narrative. He has, he asserts, absolutely verifiable sources. The reality is, he doesn't. He criticizes me for saying fog of war, but there are other reports that have to be taken into account. The charge that Russia deliberately targets civilian facilities and centers is, of course, a part of the growing anti-Russian line that's captured our politics and has led to this scandal in Washington.

I think we need to step back for a minute. And I won't speak of my own involvement in human rights or civil liberties, because I'm older than both of you, and I would have you at a disadvantage, because I'm not sure you even remember these struggles—you do, but I'm not talking about only in the South, but in Russia and elsewhere. Putin said, prior to sending his Air Force to Syria, just over a year ago, in September 2015, I think—said it at the United Nations. He said it to President Obama. He said it at every press conference. During the period, three-year period, prior to that, the United States claimed it was fighting the Islamic State—and, of course, Mr. Roth is right: There are different terrorist groups fighting in Syria, some in Palmyra, some in Aleppo. During the three years the United States claimed to have been fighting the Islamic State, the Islamic State gained more and more and more territory, after the fall of Libya, or after we overthrew Gaddafi. It gained more territory in Iraq, and it gained an enormous territory in Syria. And something new emerged in the world: a terrorist organization that had actually turned itself into a real state. I mean, it was governing these territories, running municipal facilities, collecting taxes. This was something new and exceedingly dangerous.

So Putin said we have a choice: Who do we want in Damascus, the capital of Syria? Do we want Assad, the president of Syria, or do we want the Islamic State in Damascus? This was the key policy difference between the United States and Russia. The Obama had—administration had pursued, in fact, a policy of overthrowing Assad. Dealing with terrorists in Syria, some of whom we've funded, as Mr. Roth well knows, because they claimed to be anti-Assad, meant that, in fact, as we pursued the war against Assad, the Islamic State turned—took more and more territory. And Russia decided it had had enough, because it believed Syria was vital to its national security, and it intervened, and the war has been turned around. The United States has been on the wrong side of history from the beginning of this. The United States has made its contribution, since Vietnam, at least, to the destruction of hospitals and civilian facilities, most recently in Afghanistan. Was it deliberate? I don't know. It was probably an accident. In Mr. Roth's absolutist view, everything is certain, everything is deliberate. I'm more problematic.

But look what's happening in Syria today. It's extremely interesting. The Russians and the Syrians, some months ago, took back Palmyra, this historic city, where the Islamic State had been chopping off heads in public, where it had lined up its victims and had young children—looked to be about 10, 11, 12—execute them. I'm sure Human Rights Watch reported that and protested it. And then the Russians and the Syrians liberated the city. Now Palmyra is under siege again. The Islamic State may take control of the city. What is the United States doing about it? This is what we should be asking. This is our country now, not Russia.

AMY GOODMAN: Ken Roth, your response?

KENNETH ROTH: Well, I'm glad—

STEPHEN COHEN: Well, let—wait, let me finish my point. You filibustered. Let me just make my last point. He hasn't mentioned Mosul, by the way, and whether the same thing is happening in Mosul. The American-led—

KENNETH ROTH: I just mentioned that, yeah.

STEPHEN COHEN: One second, please. There are verifiable reports that jihadists in Mosul are fleeing, because of the Iraqi-American war there. Where are they going? They're going to Syria. The United States has bombers in that area. They could stop these people from going to Syria. They're headed, I would guess, toward Palmyra. Why is the United States allowing these jihadists, these terrorists, to go to Syria? Because, possibly, they want them to take back Palmyra from the Russians and the Syrians. Now, we don't know if that's true, but the American role is highly suspect.

And rather than sit here and say the Russians are committing war crimes—because, look, one person's war crime is another person's liberation. On the front page of The New York Times this very morning, there is a story by Anne Barnard—by the way, Americans are not filing from Syrian that; they're filing from Beirut, so they're depending on different sources. But she makes an interesting point. She repeats what Mr. Roth says, that—about people being executed by the Syrian Army. But she goes on to say these can't be verified. And then, two or three paragraphs later, she reports that people trapped in Aleppo are welcoming the Syrian Army with jubilation, she reports. So, even in The New York Times, which has not been very helpful in these narratives, you see the two narratives.

And undoubtedly, part of what Mr. Roth said is absolutely true. Part of it is part of the position that he has taken more generally about Russia being mainly responsible for virtually everything bad that's happening in the world. And I'll just end by saying that, in my judgment, the real threat to our national security at this moment, number one, is not unfolding in Syria, but in Washington, D.C.

AMY GOODMAN: Ken Roth?

KENNETH ROTH: Let's get back to reality here. The U.S. has been bombing ISIS in both Mosul and in Raqqa. You know, Professor Cohen says jihadists are fleeing Mosul. That was several weeks ago. You know, since then, it's actually been encircled, and so they're not fleeing. But there's no question that the U.S. is actively bombing in Iraq. It's backed by, you know, government forces and Kurdish forces on the ground. And in Syria, it's backed by predominantly Kurdish forces with a Syrian component to it. You know, that war seems to be progressing slowly.

If you look at what the Russian role in this has been, yes, you know, a year ago Russia retook Palmyra from ISIS. These days, it's been focusing entirely on Aleppo, where there is no ISIS. If you look at—there's a group called the Institute for the Study of War, which puts out very interesting maps, basically once a month, to show where the bombardment is. And so, they show the Russian bombardment. And you can see all these little explosives around Aleppo, and, you know, one or two around Raqqa or Palmyra. I have tweeted that on my Twitter account, if people want to find it. So, I mean, there's no question that the focus of Russia and Assad today has not been ISIS. They use the terrorist rhetoric, but they've been going after the opponents of the Assad regime.

Now, you know, that's their choice. For me, the issue is how they fight the war. Now, Professor Cohen says, oh, you know, I'm just making this up that they're targeting civilians. You know, look at the hospitals. They're a very good illustration. Until September 2015, you know, at a point where it was just the Syrian Air Force in the skies, they were using these so-called barrel bombs, which are very imprecise weapons. They're essentially canisters filled with explosives and shrapnel, which would tumble to earth—very difficult to target. Since the Russians entered the war, they've got precision weapons. And so, you talk to the doctors—and which I've done repeatedly—and they describe much more precise hits on the hospital. And this is not a mistake. This is over and over and over until the hospital is destroyed. There is no question that these hospitals are being deliberately targeted. You can say, "Oh, fog of war," but last time I checked, the only people in the sky over Aleppo are the Russians and the Syrians. There's no one else.

AMY GOODMAN: We're going to have to break, and then we're going to come back to this discussion and go to this issue that Professor Cohen has raised: Washington, the Russia-U.S. relationship. We're speaking with Professor Stephen Cohen, has taught Russian studies at both New York University and Princeton, now writes for The Nation, and Kenneth Roth, who's executive director of Human Rights Watch. Stay with us.

We turn now to take a broader look at U.S.-Russian relations in the wake of Donald Trump's election. On Tuesday, Trump officially nominated Rex Tillerson, chair and CEO of ExxonMobil, to be secretary of state. Tillerson is known to have close ties to Russian President Vladimir Putin, who awarded Tillerson the country's Order of Friendship decoration in 2013. One of the focuses of the Senate confirmation hearings will be Exxon's $500 billion oil exploration partnership with the Russian government's oil company, Rosneft. Considered the largest oil deal in history, the partnership can only go through if the U.S. lifts sanctions against Russia, which the Obama administration imposed over Russia's intervention in Ukraine. The news of Rex Tillerson's nomination came just days after the CIA accused Russia of meddling in the U.S. election to help Donald Trump win. Trump has rejected the CIA's conclusion, decrying it as "ridiculous." But President Obama ordered a review of Russia's role in influencing the presidential election. With us are Kenneth Roth, executive director of Human Rights Watch, and Stephen Cohen, professor emeritus of Russian studies and politics at New York University and Princeton University.

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TRANSCRIPT

This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.

AMY GOODMAN: We turn now to take a broader look at U.S.-Russian relations in the wake of Donald Trump's election. On Tuesday, Trump officially nominated Rex Tillerson, chair and CEO of ExxonMobil, to be secretary of state. Tillerson is known to have close ties to Russian President Vladimir Putin, who awarded Tillerson the country's Order of Friendship decoration in 2013. One of the focuses of the Senate confirmation hearings will be Exxon's $500 billion oil exploration partnership with the Russian government's oil company, Rosneft, considered the largest oil deal in history. The partnership can only go through if the U.S. lifts sanctions against Russia, which the Obama administration imposed over Russia's intervention in Ukraine.

The news of Tillerson's nomination came just days after the CIA accused Russia of meddling in the U.S. election to help Donald Trump win. Trump has rejected the CIA's conclusion, decrying it as "ridiculous." But President Obama ordered a review of Russia's role in influencing the presidential election.

Still with us, Kenneth Roth, who is executive director of Human Rights Watch, and Stephen Cohen, professor emeritus of Russian studies and politics at New York University and Princeton University.

Stephen Cohen, start with the elections.

STEPHEN COHEN: Be more precise.

AMY GOODMAN: What we understand, what the U.S. allegations are around Russian intervention in the elections. The New York Times today has a major top story.

STEPHEN COHEN: Yeah.

AMY GOODMAN: "Hacking the Democrats: How the Russia Honed Its Cyberpower and Trained It on an American Election."

STEPHEN COHEN: I don't know where to begin. Let me context it, because when we first—when you first had me on, February 2014, I said we were headed for a new Cold War with Russia, and it would be more dangerous than the last one. That has happened. We now have three Cold War fronts that are fraught with hot war, the possibility of hot war—the Baltic area, Ukraine and Syria—between two nuclear powers. Things are very, very dangerous.

We desperately need in this country a discussion of American policy toward Russia. We can't keep saying an untruth, that this new Cold War is solely the fault of Putin. We need to rethink our policy, at least over 20 years, but over the last five or six years, toward Russia. That has been made even more impossible now with this slurring of anybody who disagrees from the official American position of how the Cold War arose. The slurring began against people such as myself two or three years ago. We were called Putin apologists, Kremlin toadies, Kremlin clients. It moved on to even accuse Henry Kissinger of that. And then, of course, when Trump come along, this was a great blessing to these people, who are essentially neo-McCarthyites. It's spread to The New York Times.

So we have his allegation that the Russians deliberately—word Mr. Roth likes; I think there's more accident and miscalculation in history than he seems to think—deliberately, on the orders of Putin, hacked into the Democratic National Committee, and not only, in order to—and here the narrative gets a little puzzling. The original intention was simply to throw American democracy into chaos, cast disrepute on the American political system, but then they realized that they could actually throw the election to Trump. Now we have The New York Times, what used to be a newspaper we thought would protect us from these kinds of allegations, saying in an editorial that they did this, the Russians did this, because Trump is surrounded by Kremlin lackeys. This is an extremely serious and reckless allegation, that he's—our new president is surrounded by Kremlin lackeys. They don't name names, but we know how they mean—what they mean. And both the editorial page of the Timesand Paul Krugman, who, after all, won a Nobel Prize and once was my colleague at Princeton as an economist—it's really astonishing to see what he now writes—says that Trump won only because of what the Russians did. What we have from the CIA, which itself is divided—we know that there are different opinions in the CIA—we have yet to be presented with a single fact. In this New York Times story, which rehearses, basically, New York Times' miscoverage of this whole episode, they do the same thing. They are assessments, which is judgment. They are allegations. But no one has produced how they know this with facts. Did they tap into Russian cellphones? Do they have a mole in Putin's inner circle who's telling them? Do they have satellite surveillance? We don't know.

Let me bring to your attention something that's not been reported. There's a group of very serious former American intelligence officers called, I think, Veteran Intelligence Officers for Sanity. I'm not sure.

AMY GOODMAN: VIPS [Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity].

STEPHEN COHEN: You know them. And they issued a report yesterday. I can't judge it. I'm not an intelligence person in that sense. But they believe this wasn't hacking at all, but leaking, that somebody leaked this stuff from the Democratic—in other words, somebody in the United States. So, here we have no facts presented by the CIA. The FBI itself will not go along, because it's a fact organization. It's got to have evidence that's presentable in a court. We have the possibility—I don't know, but it's offered by credible people—that this wasn't hacking, but leaking. And the result is, we're having the new president called essentially a Kremlin lackey. Senator McCain has said, to his eternal discredit, that Putin is a bully, a liar, an invader of countries, a man who's determined to destroy the American way of life, and adds, if anybody doesn't agree with Senator McCain, he's a liar. So—

AMY GOODMAN: He also calls Putin a killer. Do you agree?

STEPHEN COHEN: A killer, a murderer. No, I do not. Well, I mean, killer, in warfare, yes. He didn't—oh, well, McCain went on to say that Putin had personally ordered the killing of Boris Nemtsov, a Russian opposition who was shot down on a bridge. No one in Moscow takes that seriously, not even Nemtsov's family. But the point we have here, Amy—and this is exceedingly dangerous—is that we have a new accepted practice of labeling anyone who dissents from American policy toward Russia as a Kremlin apologist. And I know very serious people who have become afraid to speak out now, because they don't want to be labeled.

AMY GOODMAN: So, let's get Kenneth Roth's response and also to the Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, House Speaker Paul Ryan—of course, both Republicans—announcing their support for an investigation into whether Russia did hack the elections.

KENNETH ROTH: Well, by all means, there should be an investigation. I mean, why not?

STEPHEN COHEN: Sure.

KENNETH ROTH: You've got to be very careful, though, when—you know, when there are accusations against Russia, and the response is "new Cold War," as if "Let's not look into this. Might be a new Cold War." You know, let's look at the reality here. In Syria—we've just discussed this—there has been Putin's involvement in the deliberate targeting of civilians. Ukraine, I mean, Amy, you had made a major faux pas by saying that Russia invaded Ukraine. You know, that was utterly denied by the Kremlin for a long time. It was the "little green men" in Crimea, until suddenly it was Russian forces. It was, you know, just a spontaneous uprising in eastern Ukraine, until suddenly there were Russian forces behind all that. So, you know, the truth is malleable when it's useful. And I think it's—we should be focusing on the reality.

Now, I have no special insight into the hacking allegations. By all means, there should be an investigation. And I do—I am concerned about Trump's nominee for secretary of state, because, you know, here is a guy, Rex Tillerson, who has had a career in cozying up to autocrats around the world, you know, in the name of Big Oil. And he has developed very good relations with Angola, with Equatorial Guinea and with Putin. And I worry about whether a man like that, who has put the interests of Big Oil ahead of everything else, is going to be able to pursue a foreign policy where, in theory, the promotion of human rights was a major part of it. One thing these autocrats all have in common is a general disregard for human rights. And is this the person we want in charge of our foreign policy?

AMY GOODMAN: And this issue of, if he is chosen, and Exxon's desire to have these sanctions lifted, the largest oil deal in not just U.S., but in world, history, if these sanctions are lifted, would benefit his company.

KENNETH ROTH: Well, now, clearly, ExxonMobil didn't like the sanctions that were imposed on Russia because of the adventurism of these "little green men" that have nothing to do with the Kremlin in eastern Ukraine. And ExxonMobil fought that. Now, this is, you know, not a human rights issue. It's not something that Human Rights Watch has taken a position on. But it does raise questions about, you know, what is the primary concern of Rex Tillerson. And can he really, after having spent his entire career at Big Oil, his entire career, professional life, at ExxonMobil, suddenly switch hats and pursue other values as the head of the State Department?

AMY GOODMAN: Then this issue that Professor Cohen raises of a new McCarthyism?

KENNETH ROTH: Well, that's another way of saying, you know, a new Cold War. You know, just because you start accusing people who say bad things about Putin of McCarthyism doesn't mean it's not true. I mean, you know, these big labels don't help. Let's look at the facts. You know, who actually did act in Ukraine? You know, was it really just a spontaneous uprising, or was there a Russian role in this? You know, who is providing the precision weapons in Syria that have been targeting civilians and civilian institutions? Nobody else has an air force like that other than Russia. Nobody even pretends that there are planes up there above Aleppo other than Russia, with their Syrian allies. So, you know, you've got to get down to the reality here. And I don't think throwing around these names of "new Cold War" or accusing people of McCarthyite tactics has anything to do with this. Let's get to the facts. And the facts are pretty ugly right now.

AMY GOODMAN: Very quickly, I presume, Professor Cohen, that you have some concerns about Donald Trump. Are any of them around his relationship with or the—the relationship with or his professed admiration for Putin?

STEPHEN COHEN: Well, I'm kind of startled by a number things that Mr. Roth said. And I don't like the way he dismisses everything I say as kind of a way of avoiding it by referring to a new Cold War and what happened in Ukraine. I don't think he really knows what happened in Ukraine, but that could be a separate discussion between us. And then he goes back to Syria. But what surprises me is, is that a man who represents human rights, one of which is freedom of speech, or, as Roosevelt would say, freedom of fear of speech, of being afraid to speak out, isn't worried about this new neo-McCarthyism and isn't on my side on this, that we should stop this. And he's kind of—and let me finish. He's kind of mangled it. I didn't say that anybody who says something bad about Putin is the target of this neo-McCarthyism. What I said was, anybody who dissents from the orthodox account of how we ended up in this new Cold War—and if Mr. Roth thinks it's not a new Cold War, he's welcome to that thought, though he'll miss all the attendant dangers. It's the people who speak out who are being called apologists for Putin, and it's chilling debate here. So let me make the point I began at the beginning.

AMY GOODMAN: We have 30 seconds.

STEPHEN COHEN: Only, and I can say it in 10. We're in the most dangerous confrontation with Russia since the Cuban missile crisis. It needs to be discussed. And at the moment, it can't be discussed because of these charges that everybody is a client of Putin who disagrees with the mainstream opinion. And it's coming from the Senate. It's coming from The New York Times. It's coming from—and I wish we had a second to say what the motives are. But one motive is to keep Trump from going to the White House. Another is to delegitimize him before he gets there. But the main motive—and you can hear it clearly—is Trump has said he wants cooperation with Russia, and the war party here that's against that is determined to stop it. And the way you do it is level against Putin the kinds of accusations that Mr. Roth uncritically levels, so the rest of us will say we can't have any cooperations with Putin because he's a war criminal.

AMY GOODMAN: Twenty seconds, Ken Roth.

KENNETH ROTH: Well, I'm all for talking with Putin, trying to cooperate with him. In fact, my New York Review piece argues that the key to Syria is for Trump to put pressure on Putin, because Assad wouldn't be able to commit these atrocities without Putin's active support. So, I'm—

STEPHEN COHEN: That's not talking with Putin; that's putting pressure on Putin.

KENNETH ROTH: And talk to him, too. And we never objected to the ongoing debate, the ongoing conversation, but it shouldn't be in lieu of the kind of pressure, which is all that Putin listens to these days.

STEPHEN COHEN: Oh, for God's sake. That's all he listens to. And you base that on what? Your careful study—

KENNETH ROTH: I'm watching—I've watched—

STEPHEN COHEN: Your careful study of Putin? Your following of Russian politics?

KENNETH ROTH: I've watched two—yeah, I've watched—let me answer. Let me answer.

STEPHEN COHEN: Look, at some point, let's be fact-based, OK?

KENNETH ROTH: I've watched him for two years—

STEPHEN COHEN: You simply don't know what you're—oh.

KENNETH ROTH: —talk and talk and talk with Kerry and Lavrov.

STEPHEN COHEN: Oh, oh.

KENNETH ROTH: And he just continued with the atrocities.

STEPHEN COHEN: You watched it, or you listened to what he said? Or you listened—you read it?

KENNETH ROTH: The only way to ratchet up—the only way he has made any—

STEPHEN COHEN: Oh, for God's sake.

KENNETH ROTH: —change in Syria is when the pressure mounts.

STEPHEN COHEN: We're back to Syria now.

AMY GOODMAN: We're going to have to leave it there. We're going to have to leave it there, but I want to thank you both for being a part of this discussion. Stephen Cohen is professor emeritus of Russian studies and politics at Princeton and New York University. And Kenneth Roth is executive director of Human Rights Watch. This is Democracy Now! 

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