Trump continues Obama policies

By Cliff Kincaid

The Heritage Foundation article "We Don't Have to Choose Between Putin and George Soros" is a very effective rebuttal to claims in the media that conservatives who oppose the influence of billionaire George Soros in foreign affairs are therefore siding with another billionaire, Russian ruler Vladimir Putin. The author, Mike Gonzalez, looks into the global struggle playing out on the international stage between these two major figures, and how conservatives are smeared as members of the Putin camp by liberal media outlets like Politico.

Gonzalez focuses on the small country of Macedonia, where "Soros and the U.S. Embassy have thrown their support behind parties contending against the conservative party VMRO – imperfect as many political parties around the world no doubt are, but very much pro-U.S. and pro-NATO." Gonzalez examines Soros's far-left agenda of open borders, abortion on demand, and homosexual/transgender rights, and comments, "If for lack of a conservative alternative, VMRO turns to Putin to counter this far-left agenda coming from outside the country, that is our fault – and Soros."

It is "our fault," he says, because the State Department continues to facilitate Soros operations to transform the culture and politics of foreign countries.

Of course, President Trump and Secretary of State Rex Tillerson can change this, but they have been resistant to putting conservatives in place to change the course of U.S. foreign policy.

Gonzalez had previously examined how Soros money was corrupting the political process in Macedonia, with the assistance of the U.S. State Department. He noted that the Obama-appointed U.S. ambassador in the capital of Skopje, Jess Baily, has shown a political bias against the Macedonian conservative party, VMRO, and was promoting a left-wing coalition.

Republican members of the U.S. House and Senate asked Baily to explain reports that his embassy had selected Soros' Open Society Foundations as the main implementer of U.S. Agency for International Development projects in Macedonia. The State Department's response "was thin on details regarding funding for Soros' foundation and groups it controls," Gonzalez reports.

Gonzalez has put his finger on a dialectical maneuver that plays into Putin's hands. In response to official U.S. support for "liberal progressive policies around the world," conservatives and moderates in foreign countries believe they have nowhere else to go except Putin, the former KGB officer now operating undercover as a religious conservative touting traditional values and national identity.

The U.S., not Putin, should be promoting Western values. But Obama's State Department promoted a form of cultural imperialism that reflected the "fundamental transformation" of the United States. That is, multiculturalism, gay rights, abortion rights, and even the rights of prostitutes!

Then there is Soros' long-standing pro-drug legalization agenda, as we documented 12 years ago in our special report "The Hidden Soros Agenda: Drugs, Money, the Media, and Political Power." The leftist billionaire is accelerating his activities in Latin America on behalf of pro-drug interests.

In Costa Rica, for example, conservatives are alarmed by the push to legalize marijuana under the cover that the drug supposedly has "medical benefits." One of them told me, "What we fear is that drug traffickers will shield themselves under regulations included in the medical marijuana bill if it passes, making it easier for them to send illegal substances to other countries, including the U.S." He said the U.S. embassy in Costa Rica has been alerted to how Soros-backed organizations are putting pressure on the country's Congress to pass a so-called medical marijuana bill. "We hoped for a change of mentality from the U.S. Embassy since President Trump was elected," this source added, "but these officials are from the Obama administration and they stopped communicating with us after we mentioned Soros."

In his column "Vetting Trump's Foreign Policy Team," my colleague Roger Aronoff examined some of Trump's high-profile picks and concluded that "Trump needs to do a better job of filling key positions and vetting the people who are making and carrying out his policies. Otherwise, his administration could turn out to be a disaster."

Looking at various selections in the foreign policy and national security fields, Aronoff asks, "Are these rookie mistakes or does Trump not care if his campaign promises regarding Israel, combating the Islamic jihadis, and ripping up the Iran deal go unfulfilled?"

Incredibly, as Aronoff notes, Trump himself "has signaled his unwillingness to fill many of his political appointee posts" with committed conservatives.

By continuing Obama's policies and keeping Obama personnel in place, as Mike Gonzalez of the Heritage Foundation demonstrates, Trump is actually furthering the foreign policy goals of Putin. If this continues, it will constitute a form of collusion between the Trump and Obama administrations.

Perhaps that was the goal of the so-called "silent coup" all along – to keep in place the Soros policies financed by the Obama administration. If so, it appears that Trump has lost another big battle that will make his health care defeat seem like small potatoes.

© Cliff Kincaid