Interesting take on the tete-a-tete from Masha Gessen, who knows more about Putin than is good for anyone:

Mr. Putin has for years — 17 years, to be exact, for this is how long he has been in power — been clear about what he wanted from his relationship with the United States president: He wants to be treated as an equal partner on the world stage and not to be questioned about or pressed on the Russian government’s actions inside Russia or in what he considers his sphere of influence. Despite the friendly tenor of Mr. Putin’s relationship with George W. Bush and the offer of a “reset” made by Barack Obama’s administration, Mr. Putin never achieved his objective — until now. His fourth American president has given him exactly what he wanted: respect, camaraderie and freedom from criticism.

The one accomplishment of the meeting — a limited cease-fire in Syria — is exactly what Mr. Putin wanted. Not the cease-fire, that is: He wanted an acknowledgment that the United States and Russia are equal negotiating parties in the Syrian conflict. He spent years cajoling and then blackmailing the Obama administration into accepting Russia’s decisive role in the Middle East. Now, Mr. Trump has handed him much more than that. He has demonstrated that Russia and the United States can negotiate Syrian life and death without involving any Syrians.

Lovely column by Jack Shafer. Sample:

If the mark of a great diplomat is the ability to speak craziness with a straight face, Tillerson earned admittance to the Dips Hall of Fame. A “framework” for cybersecurity cooperation would be set up between the two countries, he promised. This would be like going into the fencing business with the guy who burgled your house. Sounding more like a therapist than the secretary of state, Tillerson said, “We’re unhappy. They’re unhappy,” and explained that salvaging this “really important relationship” meant blotting out the recent unpleasantness. (Take a shot of amnesia and call me in the morning.) Then Tillerson produced a laugh line that topped his previous ones. “The Russians have asked for proof and evidence” of the meddling, he said. Perhaps he should buy Putin a subscription to the Washington Post.

And remember, Tillerson was the smart one representing the United States in the room.

The meeting was a giant exercise in “Don’t Think About Russian Meddling,” restoking speculation on what Putin might have on Trump. Back in the U.S.A., heavy sobbing sounded in the corridors of the deep state, where hankies and terry cloths were filled with tears. The gnashing commenced Thursday when Trump gave one of his rambling, having-it-both-ways speeches in which he concluded that the Russians meddled in our election but also that “nobody really knows” whether they did and besides it could have been “others.” This conflicts with the findings by every tier in the U.S. intelligence establishment, which insists the Russians—and the Russians alone—did it.

The biggest puzzle, of course, is why Trump fawned on Putin at the G-20. In the old days, when he was just a property developer, it might have made sense for him to suck up to Vlad when he was staging a beauty ‘pageant’ in Moscow and looking for Russian cooperation in his business ventures. And, Shafer writes,

As many have noted, he has a natural affinity for strong men bound by nothing more than their own appetites. But the display in Hamburg defies reason. Instead of acting like the leader of the first world, Trump is acting like a job applicant, beveling his words so as not to offend Putin. The same goes for his secretary of state. As the G-20 talks slip into the rear-view mirror, Trump has positioned himself in Putin’s garden as a piece of statuary, perhaps a toad, locked into a perpetual smile in the direction of his master.

Image source

Well, well. The days when the tech guys avoided politics are well and truly over. See, for example, this from Recode:

With the entire House on next year’s ballot — and about one-third of the U.S. Senate up for a vote, too — the stakes are high for those in the Bay Area who seek to erode the GOP’s control of Congress and erect a new bulwark against Trump’s agenda in areas like immigration and climate change.

But some of the region’s most politically active executives — including Eric Schmidt, the executive chairman of Google’s parent company, Alphabet; and Elon Musk, the founder of Tesla and SpaceX — have contributed generously to Republicans in recent months in a bid to maintain steady relationships with both parties.

At the end of March, for example, Musk chipped in $50,000 to an organization run by House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy that’s meant to boost his GOP allies. Musk also donated roughly $34,000 to the Republican Party’s official arm for electing lawmakers to the chamber, federal records show.

Yet Musk’s support comes despite his public rift with the president.

Initially, the SpaceX and Tesla founder tried to maintain a positive working relationship with Trump, even serving as an adviser to the White House on economic issues. But Musk severed those ties in June, citing Trump’s decision to withdraw the United States from the Paris climate agreement — a pact to reduce carbon emissions around the world that Musk and other business leaders had supported. A spokesman for Musk did not immediately respond to emailed questions on Thursday.