Donald Trump’s son-in-law was reportedly being discussed in call between foreign intelligence officials that was intercepted and allegedly supressed by Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard
A whistleblower complaint raised against Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard last year revolves around President Donald Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner, according to reports.
The highly-classified complaint, submitted in May 2025, alleged that the National Security Agency failed to publish an intelligence report about a phone conversation, intercepted by a foreign spy service, between two overseas intelligence officials concerning Iran in which a person linked to Trump was under discussion.
Instead, the complaint alleged, Gabbard presented a paper copy to the president’s chief of staff Susie Wiles, and told the NSA to supply further details to her office, rather than making it more widely available within the intelligence community as would have been expected.
The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal now report that the Trump associate who was mentioned in the call was Kushner.
It’s not about oligarchy, it’s about the mafia state. And Russia has been a full-on mafia state since Putin came to power.
I would say that mafia state and oligarchy are roughly synonymous.
The difference lies more in the perception of a given country: Russia is an oligarchy because all power is in the hands of a few. It is seen as a mafia state because Russia has a horrible reputation on the world stage, which is why those in power have a reputation for enriching themselves out of pure greed. Of course they do, but so do despots in other oligarchic countries - only here it is sometimes still considered legitimate state action, even if it, in fact, only benefits a powerful elite.
In contrast, a plutocracy is also an oligarchy, but a special case of it, since wealth is the main source of power for the elite who control the country.
However, now that the US elite is apparently replacing it’s sham democracy with autocratic tyranny, as in Russia, the US is also increasingly becoming an oligarchy in the sense of a dictatorship.
I think it is undisputed that both Russia and the US are led by serious criminals, by a mafia, which, however, has so far only been referred to as such in Russia.
But since the US regime apparently no longer has any scruples about openly committing the most depraved crimes and - like Putin’s crew - shamelessly enriching itself, the US’s international reputation will also rapidly deteriorate, as is already the case.
Today, you will hardly find many people in any country of the world who still believe anything the White House says, given the obvious lies coming out of there.
In short, both countries are mafia states, but the US is so powerful that the oligarchs here are much more dangerous because of their disproportionately greater influence on other countries.
I hear what you’re saying, but Russia is much farther down the road than the US is. There isn’t even a veneer of democracy or free press in Russia. People being pushed out of windows, single party state, outright banning of dissent, etc. Trump is moving fast in that direction, but Putin has a decades-long head start on him.
Yes, that may be true for now, but the US regime is currently obviously working to change that - and fast.
I mean, masked fascist thugs are randomly kidnapping and even murdering people in broad daylight, and the highest law enforcement authorities are not only protecting pedophiles, but are also clearly enabling their decades of monstrous deeds in the first place. This has nothing to do with even a halfway functioning system, especially since the US government is trampling on the law as if it was beneath them - they just don’t care anymore because no one is stopping them. This is evident in the fact that even the most heinous crimes do not result in any consequences for those responsible - and this has been the case for quite some time in the US as well.
None of this is even remotely compatible with a democratic constitution.
I agree 100%. I’m just saying that Russia is objectively worse, and has been worse for far longer.
I’m not defending the US, just pointing out that it’s not the most corrupt mafia state in the world.
As I said, that’s true, of course, but the question is how long it will remain that way. I can hardly see any difference already, and I don’t see how things in the US are going to get better.
The only possibility, in my opinion, is for the people to rise up and overthrow this blatantly corrupt system. They still have the chance to do so at the moment, as the authoritarian regime with its secret police loyal to no one but the organge godfather (in the form of ICE with a budget that compares to the military spendings of a medium sized country) is still in the process of being fully established.
To be honest, however, I have little hope that the American people will do this - yes, there are massive protests, but there are no signs of a nationwide, organized general strike that could bring the regime to its knees. I don’t think these ruthless criminals will be impressed by anything else, because they hold all the cards.
Yeah, I have the same fears.