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Soviet Premier Josef Stalin and US President Franklin Delano Roosevelt appear on the porch of the Russian embassy in Tehran, Iran in 1943.Newscom

Imagine this scenario: In a period of protracted economic crisis, the American people elect to the presidency a scion of a wealthy New York family who appeals to the working class and connects with voters through a new form of popular media . Once elected, he cultivates a close relationship with Russia and its strongman leader , belittling long-standing intelligence on a country commonly perceived to be a threat to American democracy. As president, he purges the State Department of trusted advisors and installs as ambassador a Russia apologist who publicly praises the countrys dictator and looks the other way at Russias human rights abuses. Finally, the President turns his back on old European alliances, tacitly supporting Russias military expansion into Eastern Europe and Asia, bringing about a new geopolitical order.

If you think Im talking about Donald Trump , youre off by about 80 years. What Im describing is not the much-discussed bromance between Putin and Trump, but the uncritical friendship that lasted (to the confusion of many Russia experts) throughout the 1930s and early 40s between that great villain of the twentieth century and the man now considered one of its great heroes: Joseph Stalin and Franklin Delano Roosevelt.

Im a novelist, not an historian. But for the last eight years, in doing research for my new novel, The Patriots , set mostly during the Cold War, I have immersed myself in history: reading historical accounts, biographies, and even spending considerable time in the KGBs archives. One of the books I found most helpful was Dennis J. Dunns Caught Between Roosevelt and Stalin, a comprehensive study of the five ambassadors to Moscow appointed by FDR. In reading Dunns descriptions of Roosevelts foreign diplomacy, I couldnt help but be struck by the resonance of that period with our own. And while during a time of great anxiety about Americas shifting alliances it may seem provocative to compare the president who assured Americans that the only thing we had to fear was fear itself with the president who has stoked fear with tweets, the ideological and temperamental differences between Roosevelt and Trump should not blind us to the fact that both entered office under similar conditions and both took similarly favorable stances toward Russia. What can we learn from these similarities? And what can they tell us about what lies ahead for the Russia-America relationship?

Roosevelt, like Trump, came to power on a largely domestic agenda. Americans were far less concerned with the future of Europe than with finding work and putting food on the table. Unlike his predecessor, Herbert Hoover, FDR was attuned to this popular sentiment. Some of his closest advisors, like W. Averell Harriman, were shocked at how little Roosevelt seemed to care about the international situation. Writing in his journal, Harriman noted that the President consistently shows very little interest in Eastern European matters except as they affect sentiment in America.

Before Roosevelts election in 1934, the executive branch and Congress had snubbed Russia. Convinced that the new Bolshevik government was eager to undermine the American government through spying and meddling via the Communist International, or Comintern (think of todays hacking scandals), they refused to recognize the Soviet Union and send an ambassador there. This, by the way, did not stop American companies from selling to the Bolsheviks millions of dollars worth of steel and technology for its new factories, and doing so with the tacit approval of the same politicians who lambasted the Red Menace in the press. But it took Roosevelts intervention to turn Americas official policy around.

Russia was eager to encourage such a reversal. It felt isolated by the coalition of anti-Communist states in Europe, and its cash reserves were alarmingly low. To feed its workers, it was starving its peasants. The modern parallel to this is the American and European policy of sanctions, which has hurt Russias economy and caused it to deplete its foreign exchange reserves, which some experts believe might run out by the middle of 2017.

It is no surprise then that Stalin desired the United States as a partner. He cemented the alliance by convincing Roosevelt that Russia was turning Communism into a national project rather than fomenting an international class war. And Stalin pointed to the common enemy of Japan, which had invaded Manchuria on the Soviet border in 1931. (Its worth remembering that it was ultimately an attack by Japan that got America into WWII and on the side of the Russians).

But Russia needed America, with its shipments of steel and low-interest loans, far more than America needed Russia. Prior to Roosevelts presidency, officials in the State Department had insisted on a quid-pro-quo relationship. In return for recognizing the Soviet Union, they wanted Stalin to stop interfering in American affairs through its agents at Comintern, and take a softer stance to the Ukraine, where Stalin had orchestrated a famine. FDR could have easily demanded at least some of these concessions. Why didnt he?

As they say in Russia: Another mans soul is darkness. Its impossible to know exactly what motivated Roosevelt, but its clear that his affinity for Stalin was more than just strategic. It is known from Roosevelts statements that he believed that the Russians and the Americans were on a path to convergence. He believed that as the U.S. was moving away from unfettered capitalism toward state-managed socialism, the Soviet Union was moving from autocratic communism to socialist democracy. Though a member of the elite, FDR was at heart a populist, and he saw in Stalin, a man of the people, a reflection of his own mandate. He was intrigued by Stalins autocratic style and admired him as a man who, to lift up his nation, was not afraid to knock heads.

Russias blunt trajectory appealed to FDR more than the tired alliances of Europe. Just like Trump, Roosevelt had contempt for the old European order. He found the European leaders snooty, clubby, imperialist and entrenched in long-standing intrigues into which they were constantly trying to wrangle America and England. Rather than trusting in the efficacy of quid-pro-quo diplomacy (e.g. sanctions), FDR the populist believed in the power of personality to affect diplomacy. When Russia did not play by the rules (as it usually didnt), Roosevelt preferred not to issue reprimands but to have his ambassador arrange yet another face-to-face meeting between himself and Stalin, presumably so that, like George W. Bush, he could look into the mans eyes and see his soul.

This more than anything frustrated the traditionalists in Roosevelts government the experts, who, like today, demanded a reciprocal, tough and morally objective approach when it comes to Russia. After the war, Harriman, writing in his journal, confessed, I do not believe that I have convinced the president of the importance of a vigilant, firm policy in dealing with the political aspects in various European countries when the problems arise." He was disheartened to realize that Roosevelt didn't care whether the countries bordering Russia became communized.

Recently, Trump hinted that he wouldnt care if NATO fell apart. Roosevelt, the populist, intuitively understood that most Americans didnt care about Europes future. We were too busy worrying about our domestic problems to think about the complicated puzzle of Europe, or to see the big picture: that a unified Europe was a natural check against Russian expansion. Ultimately, it took the next president, Harry Truman, to try to reverse the damage Roosevelt had done. But by then it was too late. With our help, the Cold War had begun.

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Why Populist American Leaders Love Russia - TIME

One month in, Donald Trump's presidency looks much like his campaign: a continual series of crises.

Trump's formula worked in the campaign and led to his surprise victory. So far, however, his administration is having trouble turning his election promises into a functioning government.

Trump has been confronted with a series of administrative crises while struggling to move the ball on key policy priorities. He even returned to the campaign trail in Florida on Saturday.

At his first solo news conference last week, Trump likened his White House to a "fine-tuned machine." But the president was in the midst of a personnel crisis after firing national security adviser Michael Flynn. Trump's first choice to replace him, retired Navy Vice Adm. Robert Harward, turned him down. On Monday, however, he named Army Lt. General H.R. McMaster to the post, a widely respected figure in military circles.

The White House has also been bogged down in side battles over such issues as the size of the crowd at his inauguration to voter fraud conspiracies, sapping attention and draining aides.

One of Trump's signature policy initiatives, blocking travel and refugees from seven Muslim-majority countries, has been held up by the courts and widely panned for its faulty deployment. And there are ongoing issues surrounding his potential conflicts of interest and recent reports linking campaign advisers to Russia.

Trump has said the focus on those struggles overlooks success elsewhere.

He has argued that other executive orders he's signed, besides the travel order, deserve more attention, along with emerging work on foreign policy, trade and energy. Many of his key Cabinet choices have been confirmed despite a wall of Democratic opposition, which delayed their Senate votes and helped derail his first nominee for labor secretary, Andy Puzder.

"There has never been a presidency that's done so much in such a short period of time," Trump said.

But most of Trump's executive orders are still limited in scope, and some of the more far-reaching proposals face serious obstacles before they can take effect.

Congress has yet to send major legislation to his desk, apart from measures to roll back some regulations issued in the last months of President Barack Obama's administration.

In many cases, the new administration still hasn't worked out consistent positions on such important issues as health care, immigration and taxes, which makes it hard to judge their progress.

There's also still a feeling-out period abroad, as world leaders nervously try to determine which of Trump's more unorthodox proposals were campaign rhetoric and which ones are new policies.

At the same time, Trump has attended to some less difficult campaign promises and laid the groundwork for potentially major moves. There's still plenty of time to regroup, but the first 100 days are considered crucial to enacting a new president's agenda. One month in, here's a look at some of the movement Trump has made.

Trump made no mention in his inaugural address of repealing and replacing the Affordable Care Act, despite its being a cherished Republican priority. Yet the future of the ACA, or "Obamacare," may end up as the defining policy fight of Trump's presidency.

Republican hopes for rapid repeal have been deflated by intraparty disagreements on policy and procedure.

House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wisconsin, says legislation is imminent that would partly repeal and at least partly replace the ACA. But details are scarce, and there's a widening divide between conservatives, who want a cheaper replacement that would likely cover fewer people, and moderates (especially in the Senate) who are reluctant to adopt changes that would take Medicaid or private insurance from those who have obtained it under the law.

Part of the problem is that Trump's own orders have been unclear. He initially said he would release his own plan that would include "insurance for everybody" and "much lower deductibles," but so far Congress is taking the lead.

Trump said at his news conference to expect an "initial plan" in March, without specifying its origin. It's not yet clear whether he'll intervene if Republican leaders produce legislation that falls short of his coverage goals or violates his pledge not to cut Medicaid spending, which looks especially likely in the House.

In the meantime, ACA exchanges are troubled as more insurers pull out, and delays in naming a replacement plan could spook companies further. Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price has taken some steps to try to stabilize the market while the administration works out a replacement.

The Trump administration moved quickly to implement a version of Trump's pledge to enact "extreme vetting" of travelers and a freeze on refugees from countries that pose "security concerns" a climbdown from his initial proposal to ban all Muslim travel to the United States, which almost no Republican official supported.

The confusing rollout of the executive order ended up trapping permanent U.S. residents at airports and generating widespread protests. It was blocked by the courts, which prompted an enraged response from the president. Trump has since said he plans to issue a new order rather than continue to defend the original one in court.

But there's been other movement on immigration, too. Trump issued executive orders to build his signature wall along the Mexican border, cut funding to so-called sanctuary cities and expand deportations. The Homeland Security Department is considering further directives that could authorize officials to detain and deport certain undocumented immigrants more quickly.

The wall, which would require funding from Congress, faces a variety of legal and logistical hurdles, and it's not clear that the White House has much leverage over local governments. But the administration's order broadening its deportation priorities beyond serious criminals might already be having an impact.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials say recent raids and arrests are in line with policies under Obama, but immigration activists say Trump's orders are spurring authorities to go further. In one case, a mother of two children who are U.S. citizens was arrested and deported, even though she had checked in with immigration authorities regularly after a 2008 arrest for using a false Social Security number to work.

Other areas are still to be determined.

Trump has held off calls from the right to end the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals policy, which protects young undocumented immigrants brought to the United States as children, but his long-term position is ambiguous. He told reporters "I love these kids" last week, saying the situation was a "very difficult subject" that required "heart," without elaborating on policy details.

His stance on legal immigration and foreign work visas is also unclear, and it could pit advisers against one another.

This is arguably Trump's biggest success so far. His choice of Neil Gorsuch to fill the Supreme Court seat left open by the death of Antonin Scalia earned universal praise from Republicans, and the rollout has been relatively smooth, even if Trump wasn't always happy with the process. Gorsuch hasn't been confirmed yet, however.

Trade is another area in which Trump has had at least one significant accomplishment: He formally rejected the Trans-Pacific Partnership, which he attacked regularly on the campaign trail.

Trump has continued to criticize Mexico for what he claims are unfair trade practices, and he reiterated his demand that Mexico pay for a border wall, which prompted Mexican President Enrique Pea Nieto to cancel a planned meeting.

At the same time, Trump has suggested that Congress fund construction of a wall immediately, even if no agreement with Mexico is in place. Republican leaders in Congress sound amenable, but there's no legislation yet.

The president said at a news conference with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau that he still plans to renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement, but his primary concerns were with Mexico and not Canada.

Trump signed executive orders advancing approval of the Dakota Access and Keystone XL pipelines, a departure from Obama administration policy. Smoothing their progress was a popular promise among Republicans during the campaign, but it faces opposition from environmental groups and Native American activists.

There could be more action soon, however. When he was attorney general of Oklahoma, Scott Pruitt, now the administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, led lawsuits against the federal government's regulations on emissions tied to climate change. Environmental groups are gearing up for a fight over what they expect to be a major effort to dismantle them.

Trump has also questioned climate science and criticized regulations and international agreements surrounding the topic as overly burdensome to business.

Trump campaigned on a pledge to cut taxes, although he was inconsistent on the details and changed plans entirely late in the race. He's identified tax reform as a top priority since winning in November.

As with repealing the Affordable Care Act, it's a popular Republican idea on paper, but it's troubled in practice a month into Trump's presidency. And as with health care, Trump has made fairly confusing statements about what he expects from a deal.

House Republican leaders want to adopt a new border adjustment tax, which would penalize companies that rely heavily on imported goods, to finance an across-the-board cut in corporate tax rates. Trump criticized the idea shortly before he took office, but he has since indicated that he might be open to it.

Manufacturers, whom Trump has emphasized in speeches, like the idea, but big retailers, who rely on cheap goods from abroad to stock their stores, are gearing up for a major campaign to stop it.

Trump and top advisers like Stephen Bannon have long mentioned infrastructure spending as a top priority to generate jobs and fix crumbling roads, bridges and airports. But so far, there hasn't been much visible movement in Congress.

Steve Bannon MANDEL NGAN / AFP - Getty Images

Democrats are

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Kentucky, told reporters last week that Republicans still expect to tackle the issue in some form, but he has previously warned the White House against spending too much.

Nowhere has Trump broken further from mainstream politics than in foreign policy, with even few Republican lawmakers willing to fully endorse his views.

Since taking office, Trump has sent mixed messages on his priorities, with a mix of conciliatory moves and more aggressive ones, and world leaders have

Trump has praised the use of torture even as he says he won't implement it and he has suggested that he might consider seizing Iraq's oil in the future, which Defense Secretary James Mattis

Trump is noted for his calls for closer relations with Russian President Vladimir Putin, whom he praised often during the campaign. That story got more attention after Flynn resigned over his discussions with Russia's ambassador to the United States and reports unconfirmed by NBC News that several Trump aides had contact with Russian intelligence officials during the campaign.

Trump was reluctant to accept the intelligence community's consensus report that Putin was behind hacks against his political opponents, and he has dismissed interest in the cyber-attack as an effort to undermine his legitimacy.

Policy changes toward Russia are still a work in progress, however.

Trump's secretary of state, Rex Tillerson, faced extra scrutiny from senators in both parties for his business ties to Putin. Mattis is

Vice President Mike Pence, who often took more conventional positions during the campaign,

Trump criticized NATO throughout the campaign and alarmed world leaders when he appeared to suggest that the United States might not defend an ally from a Russian attack if it hadn't paid its dues. Mattis praised NATO extensively in his confirmation hearings, but he also warned in Europe last week that the United States would "

In other areas, early bluster has given way to a different reality. After the election, Trump said he potentially would abandon the "One China" policy toward Taiwan and China as leverage to negotiate a trade deal. But he quickly backed down this month and

The Trump administration also reaffirmed its commitment to defend Japan and South Korea after the president threatened to withdraw his support as a candidate and even suggested that both countries might be better off pursuing nuclear weapons rather than relying on U.S. protection.

On Israel, his administration has

Trump also surprised some observers by opposing Israeli settlements and indicating interest in a new peace initiative at a news conference with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, even as he kept his criticism gentler than Obama had.

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It's Been One Month. How's the Trump Agenda Going? - NBCNews.com

Call it what you will: Flynnghazi. Russiagate. The Crackpot Dome scandal. No matter the sobriquet attached to the inappropriate discussions between the Russian ambassador and Michael Flynn, President Donald Trumps former national security advisor, the growing cancer from this case is not going away.

Perhaps the Russia scandal seemed like it had disappeared amid the antics of the past week, from Trumps rambling, 77-minute press conference, his Saturday rallywhere he surprised Sweden with news of some imaginary immigrant disaster the previous nightor his declaration that the news media was the enemy of the American people.

But even if Trump tries to sweep the Flynn affair aside with his now-clich proclamation that everything he dislikes is fake news, enough evidence already exists to demonstrate that this scandal could consume the administration for months to come. Little doubt, Trumps words at his press conference about Flynns Russia contactsI would have directed him to do it if I thought he wasnt doing itwill likely join the ranks of ill-advised presidential scandal comments along the lines of I did not have sexual relations with that woman Lewinsky, and I am not a crook.

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There are multiple issues at play in this matter, but the basic story is this: The United States imposed sanctions on Russia following its 2014 military incursion into Ukraine. Additional limited sanctions were put in place last year in reaction to Russias use of hacking and propaganda campaigns to influence the American election. In a December 30 conversation with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak, Flynn discussed the sanctions, raising questions of whether he had said anything to undermine the policies of then-still-in-office President Barack Obama. On January 12, The Washington Post reported that the discussions between Flynn and Kislyak had taken place. That day, Flynn denied to White House spokesman Sean Spicer that he had mentioned sanctions. Flynn also deceived Vice President Michael Pence, assuring him that they had only discussed logistics for phone calls with Trump; Pence then repeated that falsehood publicly on January 16.

All very embarrassing. But what has happened since makes clear this is more than just an issue of White House bumbling. The magnitude of the growing scandal, even without specific details of Flynns words to the Russian ambassador, require an understanding of the rules involving surveillance by the National Security Agency and the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Despite the fears of the uninformed, Americas surveillance teams do not read emails and listen in on phone calls haphazardly. There are very specific requirements that already signal that Flynns communications with Kislyak, along with any other intercepted information transmitted to representatives of the Kremlin, raise serious issues.

The first rule to understand involves the term of art, an American person. Before 9/11, the rules were quite strict: No one could be surveilled in the United States without a warrant issued by a national security court. That meant, if the NSA had detected Osama bin Laden speaking on a cell phone as he crossed a bridge from Canada to Buffalo, they would have to shut down their surveillance the second he reached the American side. A corporation based in the United States was also considered an American person, meaning any information about it had to be excised from files and memos. That meant, literally, if the NSA intercepted a conversation overseas where one terrorist told another that he would be flying to the United States on Delta, the information distributed throughout the intelligence community could include the date and the scheduled departure or arrival time, but not the name of the airline.

That system went through a huge overhaul in the aftermath of the Al-Qaeda attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon in 2001. And some of the rules were revised again after Edward Snowden, a former contractor with the NSA, publicly revealed some of the details about the surveillance system. Even still, America is far from being out of the spy business, and for someone like Flynn to get swept up in the surveillance and analysis system requires that the counterintelligence experts in government clear some very high hurdles.

The first rule comes from Executive Order12333, signed by former President Ronald Reagan in 1981, which gives the FBI and the NSA the authority to use the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act as the basis for actively monitoring communications between foreign officials inside the United States, including ambassadors like Kislyak. In fact, the most surprising element of this entire scandal is that, barring absolute incompetence, Flynn must have knownand Kislyak certainly knewthat their conversations would probably be recorded.

This is not a matter of some simple listen to it and analyze process. The amount of data coming into the NSA alone on a daily basis is almost beyond human comprehension. The agency is something of a data factory, chopping, slicing and dicing all information coming in following a series of complex procedures. A program called Xkeyscore processes all intercepted signals before they then move on to another area that deals with particular specialized issues.

The rules for handling an intercept of a conversation between an official of the American government and the target of surveillance differ in some substantial ways from those used for average citizens. The recording would be deemed raw FISA-acquired material, some of the NSAs most highly classified information. Then that recording or a transcript of it would be read into one of the four surveillance programs codenamed RAGTIME. There are RAGTIME-A, -B, -C, and -P. Most likely, according to one former government official with ties to the intelligence community, the conversation would have been analyzed through RAGTIME-B, which relates to communications from a foreign territory into the United States (the Russian embassy is considered sovereign land of that country). The conversation could not have fallen under RAGTIME-A, because that involves only foreign-to-foreign communications. RAGTIME-C deals with anti-proliferation matters and RAGTIME-P is for counterterrorism. (This is the infamous warrantless wiretapping program, with P standing for the post-9/11 law, the Patriot Act.)

Assuming the Flynn recording involved RAGTIME-B, because of his position as a former director of the Defense Intelligence Agency and being the incoming presidents national security advisor, the intercepted material would be immediately analyzed. If Flynnas the White House first stated when the news of his contacts with Kislyak became publichad been engaged in pleasantries or planning meeting times for the Russians with Trump, the records of Flynns side of the conversation would no longer exist. Flynn would have been deemed an American person, and the intercepted recordings and transcripts would be minimizedthe word used in the surveillance world for when portions or all of an intercepted communication is destroyed. In other words, if the conversation was no more than How are you Ambassador Kislyak, or Lets set up a meeting for you and a Russian delegation with the president-elect, Flynns words would no longer exist in any American file.

But thats not what happened. Instead, something in the recording led the first-level analysts from RAGTIME to follow the next leg of the procedure and take the intercept to the head of the FBIs National Security Division for another review. Again, if a conclusion was reached that there was nothing in the call to raise concerns, the reviews would have stopped there and the data would have been minimized. But the division head instead decided that the intercepted conversation merited bringing the raw transcript to James Comey, the director of the FBI, and his deputy. (At the time, this would have been Mark F. Giuliano, a veteran of the bureau. Giuliano has since retired and, as of this month, was replaced by Andrew G. McCabe, a former lawyer in private practice who joined the federal law enforcement agency in 1996.) The director and his deputy were then the final arbiters of whether the intercepted communications merited further investigation. And they decided it did.

There were three communications intercepted, the first on December 18. One of them was a text message, the other two were phone calls. That raw FISA-acquired material was reviewed by analysts read into RAGTIME, who found it concerning. They took it to the head of the National Security Division, who found it concerning. That led to the transcript being delivered to the director and deputy director of the FBI. And they found it concerningin fact, concerning enough that they opened an investigation and have already interviewed Flynn.

The conversation of greatest importance took place on December 30. That was the day after the Obama administration took action against Russia for interfering with the American election with cyberattacks, expelling 35 suspected spies and imposing sanctions on two of that countrys intelligence agencies involved in hacking. It was in Flynns conversation the following day that he discussed the issue of American sanctions on Russia, which he later denied having done to Vice President Pence.

Two more events at that time raise the greatest numbers of questions. Espionage has always been a tit-for-tat game. America expels Russian spies, Russia retaliates by expelling American spies and vice-versa. Both sides already know the identities of plenty of spies working alongside the diplomats, so it is hardly difficult to throw them out as needed. But this time, Russia didnothing. President Vladimir Putin announced the same day as the Flynn call that his country would take no action in retaliation to the expulsion. Then, almost immediately afterward, Trump sent out an almost unprecedented message, tweeting at 1:41 p.m. what amounted to a congratulations to the leader of a foreign aggressor nation for essentially blowing off the American president. Great move on delay (by V. Putin) - I always knew he was very smart! Trump tweeted.

The failure by Putin to act stunned the counterintelligence experts in the government. Trumps rah-rah cheers for this almost unprecedented move were, at best, unseemly and, at worst, a sign that the president-elect was sending messages to Putin that undermined ongoing American policy. The search for information about how this bizarre situation unfolded led to the Flynn recording being discovered, analyzed and brought up the chain of command in the FBI. And on January 12, when Spicer repeated Flynns statements, followed by Pences assurances on January 16four days before the inaugurationthe FBI knew that someone with the incoming administration was lying. FBI Director Comey decided to wait before contacting the Trump team until after the swearing-in. Finally, a few days after the inauguration, FBI agents interviewed Flynn. Shortly afterward, the acting attorney general, Sally Yates, informed the new White House counsel, Don McGahn, that they had recordings that showed Flynns accounts of what he had discussed were not true. Eleven days passed before anyone told the vice president that he had been deceived into making false public statements.

Trumps tweet praising the Russian president in the middle of all of this subterfuge is troubling enough, but there is one fact that has gone relatively unmentioned: Trump either knows exactly what Flynn said, or he is incompetent. He has the full authority to ask for the raw FISA-acquired material. He could read the transcripts, listen to the recording himself, or have an intelligence analyst sit down with him and go over the conversation in detail. But Trump has never indicated he knows what Flynn said. Worse, in the 77-minute press conference, no reporter asked him that simple yes-or-no question, Have you read the Flynn transcript or listened to the recording? So at this point, Trump either knows the same information that has alarmed so many levels of the national counterintelligence experts in government and is unconcerned, or he has failed to ask for details while proclaiming he would have told Flynn to do exactly as the former national security advisor had done. Or the worst optionTrump knew ahead of time what Flynn was planning to do, and the attaboy! tweet to Putin was part of it.

So, what did the president know and when did he know it? As previously reported in Newsweek, some of Americas allies, including one foreign intelligence service that also intercepted at least one of Flynns communications with the Russians, are trying to figure that out. Meanwhile, the FBI is hard at work investigating the mess of Russia, hacking, Flynn and whoever else gets dragged into this mess.

The investigation apparently has already dug up a lot of information. After lots of foot-dragging by Republicans in Congress who were not eager to investigate Russias influence and dalliances with the Trump team, Comey sat down with members of the Senate Intelligence Committee to brief them on what he knew. The meeting lasted for close to three hours. When the senators emerged, there was no more shrugging of shoulders about the Russia scandals. Senator Marco Rubio tweeted out, I am now very confident Senate Intel Comm I serve on will conduct thorough bipartisan investigation of interference and influence. Letters from members of Congress were sent to the White House demanding that no documents related to contacts with Russia be destroyed. No one is screaming Fake news! anymore when it comes to the Russia story. Except, of course, President Trump.

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Why the Flynn-Russia Affair Is So Troubling for Donald Trump - Newsweek

Daily Kos

Trump condemns 'horrible' anti-Semitism BBC News US President Donald Trump has condemned dozens of violent threats made against US Jewish community centres in the past few weeks. "We have to fight bigotry, intolerance and hatred in all of its very ugly forms," he said while visiting an African ... Donald Trump finds it insulting to talk about anti-Semitism, while vandalism and threats go onDaily Kos Hillary Clinton Calls On Donald Trump To Condemn Anti-SemitismHuffington Post Donald Trump says anti-Semitism 'is horrible, and it's going to stop'The Independent all 103 news articles »

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Trump condemns 'horrible' anti-Semitism - BBC News

New York Times

Donald Trump's Australia New York Times MELBOURNE, Australia In the days after President Trump's ban on immigrants from several Muslim countries, Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull of Australia spent a lot of time saying nothing. He said nothing about the ban itself, enduring days of ... and more »

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Donald Trump's Australia - New York Times