I am stealing the title of Alastair Crooke’s recent post on Trump and Russia because that was the starting point of my interview with him this week. It is now up on Counter Currents and is embedded in this piece.

Goods and services can be sanctioned, or they can receive a tariff, but it makes no sense to do both in succession. While Donald Trump is liberal with threats of tariffs, there are fresh reports that the US is planning further sanctions on Russia unless it comes to the negotiating table. The Kremlin has dismissed this as “nothing new”.

The 47th president wants to end conflicts but not resolve them

Donald Trump’s election victory can genuinely be called a miracle, given the powerful political, financial, judicial, informational, public, and criminal forces that tried not only to prevent it, but also to imprison him for decades or even kill him. Let’s add to this that at the age of 78, campaigning while facing large enemy armies is difficult.

And unspeakable lows in presidential pardons

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump threatened on Wednesday to impose stiff taxes, tariffs and sanctions on Russia if an agreement isn’t reached to end the war in Ukraine, a warning that is likely fall on deaf ears in the Kremlin. The United States already prohibits the import of virtually all Russian products, and Russia has faced a multitude of U.S. and European sanctions since the invasion began almost three years ago.

With U.S.-Russian relations at their most strained since the Cold War, reducing the risk of direct military confrontation and stabilizing global security, the United States must balance firm deterrence with strategic diplomacy to turn a bitter rivalry into competitive coexistence.

OFAC has targeted Russia’s major oil companies and insurers as well as over 180 tankers in the shadow fleet. But will it make a difference?

The recent U.S. presidential election illuminates the fragility of American democracy. Decades of political and social polarization have produced a highly unsettled American electorate with a deep distrust in democratic institutions. Political and social divides, compounded by economic inequality and entrenched partisan warfare, have catalyzed the emergence of authoritarian-leaning voters and enabled more extreme ideological factions within both parties, with the Trumpist faction in the Republican Party as the most radicalized one.

A key player in coordinating U.S. military aid and marshaling international support for Ukraine has left the Pentagon just days before DONALD TRUMP takes the White House and puts its own imprint on the war.