Smile, You're on Comrade Camera

​In another part of social media yesterday, I was in a discussion about Trump's stunningly-reprehensible comments that pretty much gave a pass to Russia for what has been described by experts as perhaps the worst cyberattack against the United States in its history.  The old standby subject came up of what on earth could Russia possibly have on Trump, and my friend Don Friedman wrote that "My theory is that either Putin has scandalous video/photos or Trump is indebted to Russian-affiliated banks, or both. It's critical that we find out the truth about him, since he's likely to continue to be influential in the Republican Party."

I wrote that for me it's Yes on both. But the thing is, I also think that few complicated things in life have just one answer -- even if "both" counts as only one answer.  To me, it's likely that there are several reasons for something that goes this deep and horrible, most of which are intertwined.  For instance, from all we actually do know, it's difficult to think there isn't money-laundering documentation that the Russians have on Trump.

Yet for all the many possible reasons that overlap, I've long felt there's another explanation so basic that I can't even imagine it not being possible, if not probable, if not near-certain --

After all, it starts with the reality that know Trump loves to talk about himself and brag about how great he is and that he's a "very stable genius" and that he alone can fix problems and knows more about issues than experts and also how he loves screwing others and proving it all because he's so deeply insecure. I mean, after all, he not only bragged to the country in a presidential debate that he didn't pay taxes, but said he did so because he was "smart."  And to put down his FBI Director and show how much he knew, he also gave away code-level secrets in the White House to the Russian Foreign Minister and Russian Ambassador 

So, with that rock-solid reality in mind, I am absolutely, 100% sure that for a couple decades -- long before he even thought of running for president -- when he was going to Russia to just do business there, like the Miss World pageant and trying to build projects, that during all those visits Trump was always going to parties and business meetings and bragging about how he screwed over the U.S. government and his competitors with illegal activities and that they were all SO stupid and just low-level government functionaries and lousy businessmen who were losers and suckers, and he was brilliant and so much smarter than them all which is why they'd never catch him. And here's what he did and how, and they're all just fools who never could see it.  Ha ha ha ha ha. 

And all the time, the Russians he was talking to were saying, "Could you please talk louder into the carnation in my lapel and please look into that mirror." Just like the Russians do for every prominent foreigner who comes into the country -- and have been doing so for 70 years.  And all of it saved for when they might need it for any reason, business or political, and turn that person into an asset

Indeed, I don't think I can even imagine the Russians not having miles of audio recordings and video on Trump going back 20 years. Miles of recording of him admitting to all manner of crimes and anything else problematic to him.

If Alan Funt was still around, he could buy the rights to those recordings and put on another several years of his Candid Camera TV show with Trump alone.

I'm sure there are many things the Russians have on Trump.  But for all those possibilities, I not only think the foundation under it all is that ​for decades Trump himself just willingly talked and bragged and yammered and gave them all they needed to start with -- but I don't think I can even imagine the remote likelihood that they don't have all this.