Interestingly, part of the reason that, until now, Trump has been supported in Russia is due to translation. If you read the Russian language papers like I do, you’ll notice that the Russian translators don’t verbatim copy what Trump says. Instead, they’ll translate what he’s saying into short, professional, statesman-like statements, instead of what he really says. So instead of “I think nuclear weapons should be way down, and reduced, that’s part of it.”, the Russian audience gets a statement that translates back into English as “I think we’ll start with a substantial decrease in nuclear weapons stockpiles.” When Trump calls something “dumb” or “sad”, the Russian press will have him call it “damned”. “Bad hombres” becomes “armed bandits” and so on.
The Russian support for Trump becomes a lot easier to understand when you realize they’re literally not listening to the same person we are.
It’s really weird to see translation add nuance to a politician’s talk rather than take it away, but this makes so much sense.
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Thoughtfulfangirling 