US Presidential Candidates Are Going Crazy Over Russia

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2016 GOP presidential candidate says he would be pals with Vladimir Putin, while 2012 GOP presidential candidate says the U.S. will soon struggle with the same kind of economic problems Greece is facing now. Are the U.S. presidential candidates going crazy?

Businessman and 2016 GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump called Edward Snowden a “total traitor” and said he “would deal with him harshly” if he is elected President of the U.S.

In an interview with CNN, Donald Trump said that if is elected President of the U.S., he would be able to reach an agreement with Russia to return former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden to American soil.

“If I’m president, Putin says ‘hey, boom — you’re gone’ — I guarantee you that,” Mr. Trump said during the interview.

He added that he would become pals with Russian President Vladimir Putin as he knows how to deal with Russia.

“And if I were president, Putin would give him over. I would get along with Putin. I’ve dealt with Russia,” Trump said.

However, the chances for 69-year-old Donald Trump to be selected as the GOP presidential candidate in 2016 are extremely low. He is mostly considered as a candidate-celebrity, the goal of whom is to not be elected, but to attract attention of the media.

In June 2013, former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden sent The Washington Post and The Guardian a series of secret materials about the spying programs conducted by special services of the United States and the United Kingdom.

After transferring the files, Snowden fled to Hong Kong, and then to Moscow, where he spent some time in the transit zone at Moscow’s Sheremetyevo International Airport. Russia granted him a temporary one-year asylum on the condition that he stops carrying out his operations against the U.S.

On August 1, 2014, Russia gave Snowden a three-year residence permit in Russia, which allowed him to travel not only across Russia, but also beyond its borders.

China and Russia are destroying U.S. influence

Two international organizations, SCO (Shanghai Cooperation Organization) and BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa), allow both Russia and China to promote their regional interests and team up in fighting the global dominance of the U.S., according to the analysts from Stratfor.

Summits of countries-members of BRICS and Shanghai Cooperation Organization are a “benchmark of evolving relations between China and Russia,” Stratfor analysts say.

In the analysts’ opinion, China sets economic direction for the organizations, while Russia outlines their political role and pushes their members to expand cooperation in areas of security.

By adding two new countries to the SCO – India and Pakistan – the organization lays a foundation for future economic space, which will be able to compete with the European Union as well as the United States, while weakening such U.S. economic leverages as sanctions and oil trade in U.S. dollars, the article states.

BRICS, the members of which comprise 20 percent of the global GDP, is also a potential alternative to the U.S. economic system, the analysts say.

Stratfor notes that both forums allow Beijing and Moscow to promote their own regional interests, while fighting economic, political and military dominance of the U.S. in international system.

“With the crisis in the eurozone, instability in Ukraine and disputes in the South China Sea, Moscow and Beijing see both a need and an opportunity to erode U.S. influence by building on their respective strengths through cooperation,” Stratfor analysts say.

The gradual evolution of both BRICS and SCO into more robust organizations indicates the strengthening relations between Russia and China as well as their stance regarding the U.S. global policy. The analysts note that despite certain distrust, the partners found common ground within the two organizations, while their united goal became the reason for the so close cooperation.

The analysts also state that “for Beijing, military might rests on a strong economic base, and global power stems as much from the ability to shape global markets as it does from military force.”

U.S. will repeat Greece catastrophe

Meanwhile, 2012 GOP presidential candidate Ron Paul believes that the U.S. will go through a massive economic crisis if China and Russia abandon the dollar for their international operations.

The U.S. is facing the same problems as Greece – excessive welfare and entitlement spending, according to Paul who wrote a piece on his website Ron Paul Institute. Ron Paul also pointed out another problem of the U.S. – its large military spending.

Only a small part of the U.S. military budget is spent on protecting the country’s civilians from foreign threats, while billions of dollars are going into imperial foreign policy, which makes the Americans less protected, the analyst notes.

“The Greek crisis provides a look into what awaits us unless we stop overspending on warfare and welfare and restore a sound monetary system,” Ron Paul writes.

According to the analyst and 2012 GOP presidential candidate, the U.S. dollar’s status “as the world’s reserve currency is the main reason the U.S. has been able to run up huge deficits without suffering a major economic crisis.” However, the U.S. currency might not be able to maintain the status, which would mean “a Greece-style catastrophe” for the U.S.

“China and Russia are already moving away from using the dollar in international transactions. It is only a matter of time before more countries challenge the dollar’s reserve currency status, and, when this happens, a Greece-style catastrophe may be unavoidable,” Ron Paul writes.

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