• In “Putin’s Washington” (Politico Magazine, January-February 2015) Luke O’Brien has penned a lengthy article about Russian lobbyists in Washington and friends of Vladimir Putin, including a Republican congressman from California, Dana Rohrabacher.
He writes: “More than anyone in Congress, he has become a reliable defender of the Russian point of view, whether it has to do with NATO expansion (‘not thoughtful in creating a better relationship with our former enemy’), the inadvisability of economic sanctions (‘instead of doing it that way, we should be making an all-out effort to create dialogue’) or the current hostilities in Ukraine, which Rohrabacher says were precipitated at least in part by Western meddling (‘I don’t think we should blame all this on Russia’).”
Describing the job Russia’s lobbyists in Washington have to do, Mr. O’Brien, a senior correspondent for Politico, says: “The flacks and lobbyists have had a difficult assignment, of course: Spin must accord in some measure with reality to be effective. And when a country uses force to reclaim former territories, stamps out dissent at home and does business with banana republic levels of corruption, reality does not allow much in the way of successful spin. One lobbyist who worked for the Russians here – and didn’t want to be named for fear of professional backlash – crudely likened his role to ‘trying to polish a turd.’ ”
The article also notes the surprising “reinvention of action-movie star Steven Seagal “as a Russia expert, via Rohrabacher,” pointing out that, “In 2013, Rohrabacher refused to hold a hearing on Russia for his subcommittee in part because Seagal was unavailable as a witness, according to a source familiar with Rohrabacher’s association with Seagal.”
To read the full text of this article see: http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2015/01/putins-washington-113894.html#.VK2WoyfyvBc.