The Chip Conspiracy

Many journalists have asked what is behind Trump’s alliance with Vladimir Putin, but no one has come close to satisfactorily explaining what’s in it for the both of them. The New Yorker once described their relationship as a Bromance, but the affection between the two men seems to be about money and power, not love. Rumors abound that Putin has got something big on Trump.

What could it possibly be?

I’m not a fan of conspiracy theories. I find conspiracy theories to be fodder for people who have flawed minds and limited intelligence. I am, however, an author who loves to write fiction.

So, I let my imagination do the walking.

The KGB has historically used Sexpionage as a way to get some embarrassing photos snapped. Blackmail. Bribery. Extortion. Blonde buxom spies lurked everywhere luring powerful men under the covers for a lusty liaison. Sexual romps were by no means limited to men and underage girls. People of all types, regardless of gender or sexual preference, starred in an un-dressed rehearsal caught on camera.  It used to be said that there was a Red under every bed. 

I imagine the orange-haired man enjoying the attention of two underage girls, Galina and Yuliya. Galina wears thigh high lace-up black boots with six-inch heels. She struts about the room with self-assured mockery, deftly cracking a devil’s riding crop across the back of her hand. He is lying on his back, exploring the nether regions of Yuliya’s flowering, but she is underneath a glass table top, shielded from his ministrations. She presses her hands against the glass, laughing at him. His lips retract, showing clenched dyed-white teeth, and his face is red, contorted in mild frenzy. Galina strikes the bottoms of his feet that are ensconced in black socks with deliberately hard, even strokes. Galina lets go, laughing, urinating on the glass. Her urine forms a puddle, overflowing, trickling onto the plush Red carpeted floor. The video cam captures all, including the man being jerked off by Yuliya, spanked by Galina, and the small squirt that looks like someone left the cap off of Elmer’s Glue. When they’re done, he quickly pulls up his jumbo boxer shorts over his fat ass.

A video of a Golden Shower and Dom combo might be more entertaining than the 2005 Access Hollywood tape when Trump bragged about grabbing women’s genitals, the liaisons with Stormy Daniels, Karen MacDougal, or hundreds of other blasé sexual indiscretions. But if White Fundamentalist Christian Nationalists don’t care, why should anyone else?

What could Putin possibly have on him?

I decided to let my imagination run wild.

Trump has been a frequent flier and guest of Putin’s long before he ran for President. For these two men, it’s always about power. They have had a long relationship, and a lot of money changed hands. 

When the Trump Plaza Casino and Hotel came down in a huge cloud of dust that ended the Trump era in Atlantic City. Trump often boasted of his success in Atlantic City and for once he did not lie. Regulatory reviews, court records and security filings show that Mr. Trump’s casino business was bleeding money, a failure. During a time when other casinos thrived, Trump’s casinos and his other businesses did poorly. Trump shifted personal debts to the casinos and collected millions of dollars in payments. He screwed his investors, defaulted on his loans and put a number of local contractors and suppliers out of business. At the same time, Trump’s real estate empire in Manhattan was also failing. Yet, Trump continued to amass a personal fortune.

In 1990 Trump needed to make a 18.4 million interest payment to avoid complete financial collapse. Trump’s father, Fred C. Trump, bought $3.3 million in casino chips to get an infusion of cash. The Casino Control Commission fined the casino because it had made an illegal loan. Trump took a lot of money out of the casinos along with financings and money from other sources. Atlantic City was a good cash cow. There is no better place for dirty money to change hands than in a casino.

Where did the dirty money come from?

Ivana Trump might have known, but she tottered on high heels late one night and accidentally fell down a gilded, spiral stairwell.

Spallomi, contrabbandieri. Dirty money? Money laundering? Money launderers funnel money through legitimate businesses. Commingling dirty money with legitimate cash flow makes dirty money clean. Then the money is skimmed off the top. It’s been going on for a long time. Small businesses: restaurants, pizza joints and florists are small-time operations, making dirty money clean. There are larger forms of money laundering. Gambling. Casino chips.

There are other chips, too. Ukraine is rich in copper, lead, zinc, silver, nickel, cobalt, manganese, titanium, and lithium, the metals that make computer chips.

Trump and Putin might be seeking world chip domination. Trump has been pushing the repeal of the CHIPS and Science Act of 2023 that had been championed by the Biden Administration. The law provides tax credits and multi-million subsidies to chip manufacturers in the United States. America First! Think again. The CHIPS and Science Act didn’t give much to Putin. He was shut out of the deal.

Trump wanting to redo the CHIPS deal is my way of understanding how the leader of the free world turned his back on his European allies, Ukraine, Canada, and Mexico to form an unholy alliance with Vladimir Putin.  As a writer, I have to work out things in my mind. I know I will never have all of the information, but I need to come to an informed understanding. So, I use my imagination.

Sometimes the vision created by authors in fiction is oddly prophetic. Tom Clancy predicting an Arab Terrorist Attack in The Sum of All Fears is not only the stuff of spy novels. Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale creates Gilead, an authoritarian regime that treats women as property of the state. And George Orwell’s 1984 has arrived. All good storytelling aims to tell a larger truth. I’d gladly write a great novel called The Chip Conspiracy, but sometimes the truth is stranger than fiction.