Friends In High Places
There is nothing on this earth more to be prized
than true friendship.
Thomas Aquinas
He has no enemies, but is intensely disliked by his friends.
Oscar Wilde
He who hath many friends hath none.
Aristotle
Show my who your friends are, and I will tell you what you are.
On the nights of November 9-10, 1938, German SA paramilitary forces and civilians destroyed synagogues and Jewish-owned stores, homes, hospitals and schools, leaving behind city streets littered with shattered glass – “Kristallnacht.” Over 7,000 Jewish business were destroyed or damaged and 30,000 Jewish men were arrested and incarcerated in concentration campus – the prelude to the Holocaust that claimed an estimated six million Jewish lives.
On a Friday night in August 2017, several hundred white nationalist wielding torches marched on the University of Virginia campus chanting “Jews will not replace us.” Days later the President of the United States declared, “You had some very bad people in that group, but you also had people that were very fine people, on both sides….”
North Korea Kim Jung Un holds an estimated 80,000 to 120,000 political prisoners and it is estimated that 40% die of malnutrition each year; in 2019, a Seoul-based human rights group identified at least 323 sites in North Korea, where public executions have taken place. The most common “crimes” committed by the victims: “stealing copper and livestock,” “anti-state” activities and illegally crossing into China.
The North Korean dictator once blew up one of his generals with an anti-aircraft gun for falling asleep at a meeting and Kim has had five top-level officials executed because of the failure of the Trump-Kim negotiations. Nonetheless, the President of the United States has declared Kim “my friend… he likes me… we fell in love. No really. He wrote me beautiful letters… He speaks and his people sit at attention. I want my people to do the same… He’s very talented … Really, he’s a great personality.”
With the murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi and the indiscriminate bombing of Yemini civilians and hospitals, schools and other infrastructure in a war that has killed tens of thousands and displaced millions more and left the country on the brink of famine, Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman exposed his real self to the world. “It is an honor to be with the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia a friend of mine… I just want to thank you on behalf of a lot of people, and I want to congratulate you. You’ve done, really, a spectacular job,” President Trump has said, despite Central Intelligence Agency conclusions that MBS had ordered Khashoggi’’s killing.
Here are some outspoken critics who were killed or died mysteriously after they had crossed Vladimir Putin:
Boris Nemtsov – Just hours after urging the public to join a march against Russia’s military involvement in Ukraine, he was shot four times in the back by an unknown assailant within view of the Kremlin.
Boris Berezovsky – A tycoon once thought responsible for Putin’s rise to power, he fell from favor and was found dead inside a locked bathroom at his home in the United Kingdom, a noose around his neck.
Stanislav Markelov and Anastasia Baburova – He was a human rights lawyer representing journalists, she was a reporter. He was shot by a masked gunman near the Kremlin; she was fatally shot as she attempted to help him.
Sergei Magnitsky – He was investigating a massive tax fraud case when he died in police custody after being brutally beaten and denied medical care.
Natalya Estemirova – She was a journalist investigating abductions and murders that had become common place in Chechnya. She was kidnapped outside her home and shot several times – including a shot in the head – and dumped in the woods.
Anna Politkovskaya – Her book Putin’s Russia accused the Kremlin leader of turning the country into a police state. She was shot at point-blank range in an elevator in her building; the judge found it was a contract killing.
Alexander Litvinenko – Upon leaving the Russian Federal Security Service, he became a vocal critic of the agency, which was run by Putin. After a series of 1999 apartment bombings that killed hundreds, he blamed the security service. He died three weeks after drinking a cup of tea laced with deadly polonium-210.
Sergei Yushenkov – He was gathering information that he believed the Putin government was responsible for the 1999 apartment bombings when he was gunned down outside his home in Moscow.
Yuri Shchekochikhin – Another journalist investigating the apartment bombings and Putin’s links, he died suddenly of a mysterious illness a few days before he was supposed to depart for the United States.
“I strongly pressed President Putin twice about Russian meddling in our election. He vehemently denied it… Now it is time to move forward in working constructively with Russia!” Donald Trump tweet of July 9, 2017.
“Things will work out fine between the U.S.A. and Russia. At the right time everyone will come to their senses & there will be lasting peace!” Donald Trump - April 13, 2017.
“So, the next time I’m with Putin, I’m going to ask him: who were you really for? Because I can’t believe that he would have been for me.” Aboard Air Force One – July 14, 2017
In an interview with Fox’s Bill O’Reilly before the 2017 Superbowl, O’Reilly questioned Trump’s respect for Putin – “But he’s a killer.” To which the recently inaugurated president responded “There’s a lot of killers. Do you think our country is so innocent? Do you think our country is so innocent?”
“We love each other” the President has said about China’s Xi Jinping
“Our relationship with China has now probably never, ever been better… He’s for China, I’m for the U.S., but other than that, we love each other” and “He’s now president for life, president for life. And he’s great. And look, he was able to do that I think it’s great. Maybe we’ll have to give that a shot.”
“China has been working very hard to contain the Coronavirus. The United States greatly appreciates their efforts and transparency. It will all work out well. In particular, on behalf of the American People, I want to thank President Xi,” the president declared, speaking of the same man who has arbitrarily detained between one million and three million Uighurs in so-called “reeducation centers” and forced them to undergo psychological indoctrination programs, subjected some to waterboarding and other forms of torture (including sexual abuse), and exploited them for cheap labor, forced to manufacture clothing for sale both at home and abroad. He’s also imposed mass sterilization on Uighur women, forcing them to take birth control medications or have abortions and putting them in camps if they resist.
In July 2020 Turkish lawmakers under the control of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan issued new orders effectively giving the government sweeping new powers to regulate social media content and setting the stage for eliminating one of the few remaining spaces for public debate. Conglomerates close to the Erdogan government now control more than 90 percent of Turkey’s conventional media and hundreds of reports have been jailed or fled the country out of fear.
Ergodan? You remember. He was one of the president’s first foreign-leader visitors in March 2017. Fifteen members of his security detail were subsequently indicted and charged with conspiracy to commit a crime of violence – on American soil - after they clashed with demonstrators outside the Turkish ambassador’s residence.
Ergadon was caught on video “emerging from his limousine, stood and watched as his guards and supporters began punching and kicking their way through a group of mostly Kurdish protesters across the street. Eleven people were injured,” according to a Voice of America account.
“I am a big fan of the President, I have to tell you that,” President Trump has said.
On October 9, 2019, President Trump addressed a letter to Ergadon urging Ergadon not to launch a military offensive against Kurdish-led forces in northern Syria. The letter read in part: “Let’s work out a good deal! You don’t want to be responsible for slaughtering thousands of people, and I don’t want to be responsible for destroying the Turkish economy – and I will. History will look upon you favorably if you get this done the right and humane way. It will look upon you forever as the devil if good things don’t happen.” BBC Turkish reported a Turkish presidential source as saying “President Erdogan received the letter, thoroughly rejected it and put it in the bin” – trashed it.
“It’s my honor to be with a friend of mine, somebody I’ve become very close to, in many respects and he’s doing a very good job: the President of Turkey.” (President Trump. June 29, 2019) “He’s become a friend of mine… He’s involved very, very strongly and, frankly, he’s getting very high marks.” (President Trump. September 21, 2017)
The Gospels tell us Jesus waited almost three years before he addressed his disciples as “My friends.”
“Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life
for his friends. You are my friends if you do
what I command you. No longer do I call
you servants, for a servant does not know what his
master is doing. But I call you friends,
because everything I have learned from my Father
I have made known to you…
John 15:13-15
Oh, that last quote up at the top:
Show my who your friends are, and I will tell you what you are.
Vladimir Lenin