Those of us who enjoy diving down rabbit holes have known about this dinner for a while. Now it’s being reported in mainstream media. Putin, retired Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, and Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein were at the table with Vladimir Putin at RT’s 10th birthday party in December 2015.
Flynn, who was already advising the Trump campaign, was paid $45,000 to speak and was seated next to Putin. Jill Stein gave her usual incoherent response when asked why she was there. Interestingly, NBC News indulges in blatant editorializing after quoting Stein. Still, the dinner is quite curious and Jill Stein is probably too dumb to realize she was being used and that RT is hardly a champion of freedom. And as one who was very active in the Green Party once, it is my considered opinion that Jill Stein is a blithering idiot.
“And my own connection to RT, you know ironically, it takes a Russian television station to actually be open to independent candidates in this country and that is a shame. A shameful commentary on our own media,” she told NBC’s Alex Seitz-Wald.
(Stein did well enough to help Russia achieve its aims. Her vote totals in the crucial states of Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Michigan were all greater than Clinton’s margin of defeat, and arguably denied Clinton an Electoral College victory.)
As for Flynn:
“It is not coincidence that Flynn was placed next to President Putin,” said Michael McFaul, U.S. ambassador in Moscow from 2012 to 2014 and now an NBC News analyst. “Flynn was considered a close Trump adviser. Why else would they want him there?”