Throughout the day, like many people, I checked on the news from Helsinki, where Donald Trump was meeting with Vladimir Putin. Like many people, I was worried. I was not prepared for what I saw.
On display for the whole world, the United States President was subservient to the tyrant of Russia. He berated his own country. He praised the tyrant.
He was led by Putin like a performing dog. When questioned, he spoke his answers for Putin’s approval, and when he couldn’t answer the questions, he watched admiringly as Putin answered for him.
It was eerie. It was like a hostage video, when the hostage has come to love the captor. The Stockholm Syndrome? Older than that. The Manchurian President? Older than that.
Call it 1984. Call it the Helsinki Syndrome. Trump loves Big Brother.
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robincravey
Robin Cravey is a Texas poet, publisher, citizen, and lawyer. As editor and publisher if Tilted Planet Press, he has published several books of poems, including Diverging, I am a Comet, and Benchmarks. His book Watermarks has been serialized on the Austin Sierran website.
A sixth-generation Texan, Robin grew up in Houston, loving tall trees, big clouds, girls, Omar Khayyam, Carl Sandberg, and Walt Whitman. He came to Austin to attend UT, loving clear water, peyote, taxicabs, women, newspapers, hitchhiking, Marcus Aurelius, and William O. Douglas. He married and had kids, loving Dr. Suess, Star Trek, Baghavad Gita, Mohandas Gandhi, and Macintosh. Eventually he volunteered way too much, published books, ran a business, fought city hall, went to law school, worked at city hall, ran a small law office, ran for public office. In recent years he has divided his time between Austin and Providence, Rhode Island, loving Wayland Square, bicycling, and long train rides.
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RobinCravey 
It’s unsettling how power dynamics can influence individuals.
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