Caitlin Johnstone

I’ve written a lot of controversial things in my young career here, and as a natural consequence of this I’ve had to learn how to deal with the surreal experience of receiving truckloads of angry comments, private messages and emails on a daily basis while still keeping my skin thin enough to be able to write poetry. It comes with the territory, and I hurl my own share of insults, so I am not complaining when I say that I have never, ever written anything that has drawn nearly as much widespread vitriol as my last few Russiagate articles.

I guess people had a lot riding on the Flynn thing. They know that this campaign they’re all engaged in needs to be fed with continuous momentum, and if that momentum ever dissipates the whole thing will vanish like smoke into the news churn. There’s an awareness that the enthusiasm and energy behind Russiagate is manipulating public opinion in a certain direction that fear of Trump makes them desire, so any suggestion that the Flynn plea isn’t what they were hoping it would be is met with a catastrophic reaction since it risks killing that needed momentum.

I noted all the way back in July that when Russiagaters run out of arguments their bold, certain statements about Trump being Putin’s [insert your prefered homophobic slur here] are always replaced by “Well you don’t know! Mueller’s going through a whole investigation and he could still totally find proof of collusion!” This has overwhelmingly been the case with the arguments I’ve received over the last few days as well. Mueller has access to all kinds of secret evidence that nobody else is allowed to see, so I should stop acting so confident that he’ll never find evidence that Trump and Russia colluded to steal the 2016 election until his investigation is over.

“Stop insisting they’ll never find anything and just let Mueller do his job!” goes the common refrain. “Just let the investigation run its course and see what happens!”

Well to tell you the truth I’d be happy to do exactly that. I’d be delighted if we could all just let this Russiagate thing go and let the investigation run its course. But that isn’t what’s been happening, is it? The frenzied campaign to keep this hysterical narrative front and center of all Trump-related conversations at all times drives Russiagaters to dominate political discourse with each new “bombshell” update that never leads to anything remotely resembling proof of their pet conspiracy theory. This behavior has helped manufacture support for internet censorship and continuing escalations in tensions with a nuclear superpower while sucking all oxygen out of the roomfor any progressive agendas as the entirety of what remains of America’s political left is drawn into collaboration with the neoconservative, neoliberal center against Trump.

Stephen Cohen is not a crazy conspiracy nut, not a Kremlin stooge, and not a Trump supporter. He's an American scholar who knows far, far more about Russia than you do, and we'd all be extremely foolish not to heed his dire warnings about #Russiagate.https://t.co/vZrCag1dJt

— Caitlin Johnstone (@caitoz) November 17, 2017

Another Empty "Bombshell" Russiagate Story#Flynn #MichaelFlynn #Russiagate #TrumpRussiahttps://t.co/yRYPTLYLte

— Caitlin Johnstone (@caitoz) December 2, 2017

I’ll tell you what, Russiagaters: how about you let Mueller do his job? Stop actively working to dominate the narrative with assertions that Trump is “in bed with Russia” based on this and that extremely thin layer of circumstantial evidence, and I’ll stop saying you’re helping the US intelligence community manufacture support for a geopolitical power grab based on lies and psyops. I wouldn’t have to keep talking about this thing if you guys would stop endangering our entire planet by acting as pro-bono propagandists for America’s unelected power establishment, putting us all at increasing risk of nuclear annihilation while making it impossible to focus on the actual, real dangerous things that Trump is doing.

As it is, these nonstop demands that I shut up and let Mueller do his job are actually just Russiagaters saying they want to be able to continue dominating American political discourse with their unsubstantiated claims without anyone pointing out how unsubstantiated they are. That’s not a thing, guys.We’re not doing that. I’m not going to shut up while you go around promulgating your entirely faith-based narrative that Mueller’s secret, invisible evidence is going to prove you right any minute now.

Russiagate only looks legitimate from inside a particular echo chamber, and even then you have to do a lot of mental contortions to make it look like a compelling narrative. As long as this pernicious narrative is neutering the political left and endangering our world with senseless cold war escalations, you can bet that I and others like me will keep pointing out the gaping plot holes in your story. If you ever get tired of that and decide that you really dowant to just let the investigation take its course, none will be happier than I. Until then, don’t piss on my leg and tell me it’s raining.

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